Visit Southeast Montana, one of 21 marketing organizations statewide in charge of increasing traffic to the state’s six tourism regions, debuted a new website design this month in a bid to better appeal to potential visitors.
According to a report from the University of Montana’s Institute for Tourism and Recreation Research, nonresident visitors in 2022 and 2023 spent nearly $6 billion dollars in Montana.
Out of the six tourism regions, southeastern Montana pulled in the fourth largest chunk of that spending at around 14 percent.
“We’ve seen growth every year since COVID, which is the trajectory we want to see, so we’re not quite back to that 2019 level, but we’re pretty close,” said Visit Southeast Montana executive director Wendy Swenson.
Marketing organizations like Visit Southeast Montana operate as nonprofits and collect a portion of the state’s Lodging Facility Use Tax.
