Visitor Spending Reached $35.9 Million in Giles County, VA in 2023
~ Tourism generated $33.3 billion in visitor spending in Virginia, marking a nearly 10% increase over 2022. ~
Giles, Virginia – Visitor spending for Giles County, VA reached $35.9 million in 2023, a 7.7% percent increase over 2022. Tourism-supported jobs in Giles totaled 360 while local tourism-related taxes were $1.9 million. This is a combined increase of 21.2% since 2019. Giles is a leader in the NRV in tourism growth.
According to the Virginia Tourism Corporation (VTC), tourism in Virginia generated a record high $33.3 billion in visitor spending in 2023. The tourism industry in Virginia directly supported over 224,000 jobs in 2023, an increase of over 13,000 jobs relative to 2022. Direct travel employment is now at 93% of pre-pandemic employment levels. Visitor-facing industries accounted for more than 5% of all jobs in Virginia last year.
Travelers spent $91 million a day in Virginia in 2023, up from $83 million in 2022. Virginia visitors directly drove $2.4 billion in state and local tax revenue, an increase of 9% from $2.2 billion in 2022. Overnight visitation to Virginia increased by 1.4 million to 43.6 million visitors in 2023, up from 42.2 million in 2022, essentially reaching full recovery to pre-pandemic levels.
“A continued attraction of visitors, seeking quality experiences in outdoor recreation, destination dining, and unique, award winning lodging paces Giles County Tourism growth at a healthy 7.7%. Our community’s commitment to enhancing the New River Water Trail and bringing online the Giles Trail Center at Mountain Lake are examples of leveraging our assets to enhance our residents’ and visitors’ destination expectations. Our partners continue to invest in their properties or operations, so we are excited to see how 2024 will continue to support our small business tourism operators, and Giles as a whole,” Cora Gnegy, Tourism Director, Giles.
Giles saw approximately 140,000 visitors in 2023. Primarily those visitors traveled from other parts of the New River Valley, the Bluefield, WV, Northern Virginia, Richmond and Virginia Beach areas of Virginia. Giles also saw growing visitation from the Charlotte, NC area and New York City area. In addition to these economic impact numbers released, Giles saw increases across website traffic and social media engagement.
All five categories of visitor spending in the Commonwealth have now fully recovered to pre-pandemic levels and beyond. Those categories include recreation, transportation, lodging, food & beverage, and retail. Recreation was the fastest growing category in 2023, up 12% over 2022 and 24% beyond pre-pandemic levels, more than any other category, as travelers continue to show a strong preference for experiences. Throughout 2023, Virginia’s visitor economy benefited from balanced hotel performance as business and group demand recovered strongly on weekdays against a backdrop of stable leisure demand during weekends.
VTC receives its annual economic impact data from Tourism Economics. The information is based on domestic visitor spending (travelers from within the United States) from per-person trips. Visitors included those who stayed overnight or traveled more than 50 miles to the destination. Detailed economic impact data and methodology are available at vatc.org/research.
