Jacob Dimond / jake@yelmonline.com
Would you be surprised to learn that in 2024, over 3.3 million people visited Thurston County — resulting in over $570 million in direct visitor spending?
During a Yelm City Council study session meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 3, Shauna Stewart, interim CEO of Experience Olympia and Beyond, presented those data points as facts to those attending the meeting. Additionally, she shined a light on what tourism means to the local economy in Thurston County.
Experience Olympia and Beyond is the “official destination marketing organization” for all of Thurston County, according to Stewart. She said the organization’s budget, which is funded through lodging tax, tourism promotion assessments and visitors, currently sits around $1.4 million.
Stewart added that Yelm’s LTAC funding in 2026 is $7,000.
“In terms of tourism, overall, the thing we love about tourism is it’s bringing new money into the region and supporting our quality of life here as residents,” Stewart said. “I’d like to say that tourism is supplementing our quality of life, supplementing small businesses and small restaurants, and the things we all love and enjoy about living here — quality parks, good health care, good transportation and infrastructure.”
Stewart added that lifestyles in Thurston County are subsidized by tourism in the region.
While speaking on the topic of sense of space, lifestyle and quality of connections, Stewart stated that she believes travelling is something that can truly change the world.
“When we travel, when we go to a new place, when we meet new people, we’re connecting with a location, a spot, and also connecting with other humans,” Stewart said. “I don’t know if you guys had ever felt that when you go somewhere and you come back a little changed. Maybe a little more hopeful, more inspired, a little more soft or interested or curious. Those are all things we love that tourism can foster. I think we have a really great community here in Thurston County that we essentially get to export through tourism.”
Stewart also provided some data points on tourism within Thurston County in 2024, which was the most recent data to the organization. She claimed that 3.39 million tourists came to Thurston County two years ago.
“What does that mean for our community? It resulted in $572.5 million in direct visitor spending,” she said. “These are dollars that are going into our local small businesses, restaurants, hotels, transportation, etc.”
She noted those data points are calculated numbers from tourism economics, but couldn’t “exactly speak” to where the data is pulled from to collect the information.
Additionally, Stewart said that the visitor economy stemming from tourism resulted in 4,076 jobs — generating $56.7 million in state and local tax revenues.
Stewart also highlighted where the money generated is going by sector, and highlighted the highest spending was in food and beverages at $174.3 million generated in 2024. It was followed by retail shopping, $118.7 million; recreation, $99.5 million; lodging accommodations, $90.9 million; and transportation, $89.2 million.
“This is always kind of fascinating. In Thurston County, we had the 3.39 million visitors. 58.8% of those visitors were day visitors. They just came for the day and left,” Stewart said. “41% stayed overnight. You’ll notice in the economic impacts that those overnight visitors are responsible for 70% of the spending, and that’s why we work so hard to drive overnight stays in our community.”
Stewart added that Experience Olympia and Beyond is working on ways to generate more lodging tax funds — and that “heads in beds” is always the organization’s goal when working.
She cited top attraction experiences, through surveys, as dining, 56.2%; shopping, 45.8%; and scenic beauty, 41.2%.
“People want to be outside. We have so much natural beauty here in Thurston County,” she said. “That’s one of the key messages that we lead with and the bountiful byway plays into that beautifully into our overall messaging. Yelm continues to evolve their events. It’s been wild to catch up on how many different events have been started in the last five years.”
With Seattle’s Lumen Field — home of the Seattle Seahawks and Seattle Sounders — set to host the FIFA World Cup this summer, Experience Olympia and Beyond is looking to capitalize on all of the additional tourism coming into the state of Washington later this year. Six total FIFA World Cup matches will occur this summer, including on June 15, June 19, June 24, June 26, July 1 and July 6.
“We are actively involved in the FIFA World Cup planning. We are running advertisements for those who are planning Seattle-based trips and looking at bringing them down here. We’re also specifically targeting Seattle-ites who are looking to escape the crowds and do some things that are slower,” Stuart said. “There is a fan zone in the Olympia area that we will be supporting. In addition to the fan zone, we’re working on capitalizing the increased visitation that’s expected to be coming through the Seattle area and inviting them down.”
