Visitors are back in the greater Tri-Cities. And so is their spending. Data from Benton-Franklin Trends makes that quite clear.

Accommodation sales in 2022 exceeded $105 million, more than $10 million more than in the prior peak in 2019. The Trends tracks accommodation sales in lieu of total visitor spending because of the proprietary nature of total visitor spending calculations.

Since accommodation outlays usually constitute the largest component of visitor spending, the direction and percentage change of sales using this metric provide a good reflection of visitor activity. After all, except for day trippers, visitors need a place to rest their heads at night.

As the accompanying graph illustrates, 2020 was a year to forget. Accommodation spending was decimated by nearly half, dropping 46% from 2019. As the graph also illustrates, the area actually outperformed, as the Washington state average decline was 58%.

With the pandemic still rampant in 2021, the area fared much better, but still was characterized by accommodation spending below 2019 levels, by about $8 million. Again, the local percentage change over 2020 beat the Washington average.

Center of the comeback pack

The 13% increase in 2022 above 2019 levels put the greater Tri-Cities in about the middle of the Eastern Washington comeback pack.

Accommodation spending in 2022 in Spokane County shot up 37% over 2019 levels. At the other end of the range, spending in the same category for Yakima County was a mere 2% above its pre-pandemic peak. Growth in industry sales in the greater Wenatchee area and Walla Walla County fell in between.

The comparison between local accommodation activity and its statewide counterpart wasn’t as favorable as before, however. The state increase over the prior year was nearly double the local result. Still, spending at local accommodation establishments climbed by 24%.

Revenge travel

With most of the data reported for 2023, it appears that visitor spending enjoyed another good year. (Some in the trade tag the 2022 and 2023 results as “revenge” spending, as consumers made up in a hurry what they lost in 2020 and 2021.) For the first three quarters of the year, accommodation spending in the two counties amounted to about 10% over the prior year. It would take a collapse of fourth quarter spending to bring the year’s results below those of 2022.

And 2024? Consider first business travel. While corporate employers have pressed the reset button on working from home, it is still prevalent in many organizations. And it has a strong following from many American workers. Yet, in spite of this arrangement (or maybe because of), the Global Business Travel Association is projecting 2024 business spending to surpass the peak reached in 2019.

Upswing of ‘bleisure’ travel

It may come with a twist, however. “Bleisure,” or the blend of business and leisure travel, is definitely on the upswing. It is something that this columnist has engaged in and, I suspect, many readers have as well. If the net effect of mixing business and private travel is to spend more nights in lodging, as it has been in my case, then overall travel spending will increase.

Strictly personal travel is highly tied to personal income gains, as vacations — short or long — obviously represent discretionary spending. What is the forecast for personal income or an equivalent, such as gross domestic product, in 2024? According to the most recent poll of forecasters assembled by Wall Street Journal, 2024 looks weak, with an average national growth rate equal to 1%. Then again, the same group of forecasters projected even weaker growth in 2023, a mere 0.2%. The actual outcome? 2.5%.

If most leisure visitors to the Tri-Cities are in-state, a forecast of economic growth, here personal income, for Washington matters. The one public forecast comes from the Washington State Economic Research & Forecast Council (ERFC), in Olympia. Four times a year, the ERFC releases its latest outlook on the state economy. The most recent version is from February.

Its outlook for 2024 points to a growth rate of 2.4% in national, nominal personal income. And for the state? A healthy 5.4%. Over the last few years, the ERFC’s forecast error has been on the side of undershooting the actual outcome.

To this observer of the regional economy, this backdrop augurs well for visitor spending in 2024.

Increases in accommodation sales, serving as a proxy for visitor expenditures, likely will not land in the low double-digits as 2023 has produced so far. But a 5% to 7% annual increase seems plausible, barring another event like the pandemic.

With inflation likely in the high 2% or low 3% range, this will represent real money flowing into the regional economy.

D. Patrick Jones is the executive director for Eastern Washington University’s Institute for Public Policy & Economic Analysis. Benton-Franklin Trends, the institute’s project, uses local, state and federal data to measure the local economic, educational and civic life of Benton and Franklin counties.