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Nashville tourism continues to boom as the effects of the pandemic fade, as seen in numbers the Nashville Convention and Visitor's Corp. released from June’s CMA Fest and Let Freedom Sing! Music City July 4 event.
This year's CMA Fest, the first in two years due to pandemic-related cancellations, generated $65.2 million in directed visitor spending, up from $64.9 million in 2019, according to newly released data from the Nashville Convention and Visitor's Corp. It remains Nashville’s biggest tourism event, 83% of this year's attendees traveling from out of town and staying an average of 5.1-nights.
June 2022 now holds the record for the most room nights ever sold in Davidson County with 875,407, immediately breaking the record set in May 2022 at 869,439. June’s hotel room count was up 11% over 2019 numbers.
CMA Fest also contributed to Nashville International Airport reaching a record number of passengers in June, at 1,832,410.
“Our attendees certainly come to CMA Fest to experience four jam-packed days of Country Music, but we know a significant number use the festival as a chance to visit Nashville. We look forward to next year’s event when we celebrate our 50th anniversary of CMA Fest,” said Sarah Trahern, CEO of Country Music Association, in the release.
Trahern previously told the Business Journals that this year was a challenging year to put on the fest, with most expenses being up 35% to 40%.
“It’s a tough year to do the festival. I won’t lie,” Trahern said. “I mean, financially, it’s a lot tougher than I expected it to be when we started planning.”
Jake Hoot and his band performs at the Reverb Stage in front of Bridgestone Arena during 2022 CMA Fest on Thursday.
Nashville kicked off July with its Let Freedom Sing! Music City July 4th, generating $11 million in direct visitor spending. Though this was down from 2021’s $14.7 million, it was expected because the holiday fell on a Monday, according to the release. Roughly 79% of attendees were out-of-towners and 7% were international.
“Major events like these are critical to sustaining our success and filling the unprecedented number of new hotel rooms opening in our city,” said Butch Spyridon, CEO of Nashville Convention & Visitor Corp., in the release “Nashville ranks second in the country in the construction of hotel rooms as a share of inventory, so we can’t take our eye off the ball and must continue to create demand for the city.”
The Big Machine Music City Grand Prix held this past weekend is estimated to have an economic impact of over $20 million for Nashville, similar to last year's numbers, though official post-event numbers haven't been released.
