Overtourism to no tourism and back again: What is Lake Tahoe’s ‘new normal’?

Lake Tahoe, USA lived through the sud­den over­tour­ism-to-no-tour­ism with­draw­al exper­i­enced by many pop­u­lar des­tin­a­tions in 2020. The area also had to endure a wrench­ing return to over­tour­ism as city-slick­ers rushed to get their nature fix after COVID lock­down. In this “Good Tour­ism” Insight, Lake Tahoe Vis­it­ors Author­ity boss Car­ol Chap­lin out­lines the crazy jour­ney before shar­ing what she believes rep­res­ents an oppor­tun­ity and chal­lenge.

At Lake Tahoe, the tip­ping point between tour­ism and res­id­ent sen­ti­ment was reached well before the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic rocked the tour­ism-depend­ent moun­tain town. Before COVID-19, the prob­lems that arrived with the crowds dur­ing tour­is­m’s peak peri­ods were begin­ning to choke out pos­it­ive res­id­ent sen­ti­ment towards our industry.

Fiercely-reg­u­lated envir­on­ment­ally, Lake Tahoe is a United States nation­al treas­ure sur­roun­ded by the majesty of the Sierra Nevada. Des­pite a bi-state (Cali­for­nia and Nevada) com­pact to over­see devel­op­ment of the area, the des­tin­a­tion’s infra­struc­ture was always destined to lag behind ever-increas­ing visitation. 

Less emphasis on destination marketing, more on destination management

For years the Lake Tahoe Vis­it­ors Author­ity (LTVA) had begun to under­stand that sus­tain­able tour­ism meant re-eval­u­at­ing our role and the use of our resources to sup­port more than just advert­ising. As a des­tin­a­tion mar­ket­ing organ­isa­tion, we were on the verge of evolving into a des­tin­a­tion man­age­ment organisation. 

For example, sev­er­al years back, LTVA determ­ined that the north­ern Cali­for­nia self-drive mar­ket no longer needed our focus. We shif­ted our atten­tion to mar­kets fur­ther afield, domest­ic and inter­na­tion­al, to attract longer-stay, high­er-spend­ing vis­it­ors. Abandon­ing our “bread and but­ter” mar­ket was cer­tainly a luxury … 

COVID-19 & the dizzy dance

Enter COVID-19.

The pan­dem­ic spun the LTVA staff into a dizzy dance of calls and col­lab­or­a­tions with the lead­ers of the Lake. We listened and learned. We set, imple­men­ted, and adjus­ted new pro­to­cols and responses to visitation. 

It is not intu­it­ive for a vis­it­or mar­ket­ing organ­isa­tion to tell vis­it­ors to stay at home. But it was the right thing to do. While our rur­al com­munity can handle mil­lions of vis­it­ors per year, our hos­pit­als can­not handle a surge of deadly COVID-19 cases. 

What to do if you are a mar­ket­ing organ­isa­tion whose mis­sion is to inspire travel and wel­come vis­it­ors? The LTVA stopped in its tracks, cut almost all advert­ising, social media, and PR, and waited.

Intu­it­ively, the right thing felt wrong. It was tough telling cus­tom­ers not to come. It was even tough­er watch­ing busi­nesses with­er on the vine. And sur­real; the struggle of a tour­ism-based eco­nomy fig­ur­ing out how to deliv­er an exper­i­ence that had mutated into a flurry of hand­made signs demand­ing masks, dis­tan­cing, and hygiene; staff des­per­ate to adapt to con­tact­less service …

The desperate droves

Then, as travel restric­tions lif­ted, Lake Tahoe swarmed with vis­it­ors again; newly-lib­er­ated city-folk des­per­ate to con­nect with nature and the out­doors. The sud­den surge as sum­mer approached was con­foun­ded by COVID-19 fatigue. Vis­it­ors were anxious — urgent, almost pan­icky — to have a mean­ing­ful, thera­peut­ic out­door experience. 

But the ther­apy didn’t neces­sar­ily make vis­it­ors more respect­ful of the envir­on­ment they had come to enjoy. And res­id­ents, want­ing them to some­how be kept away, were angered by incid­ents of bad behavior. 

It quickly became obvi­ous that LTVA’s addi­tion­al mis­sion, as a com­mu­nic­a­tions lead­er, was to edu­cate vis­it­ors in the name of sustainability.

Appreciation, opportunity, challenge

COVID-19 has rein­forced our appre­ci­ation of the high value of our des­tin­a­tion product, which, in this “new nor­mal”, is in even high­er demand than before. Therein lies an oppor­tun­ity to teach both res­id­ents and vis­it­ors a cul­ture of pro­tec­tion and respect for the des­tin­a­tion; thereby deep­en­ing and enrich­ing the Lake Tahoe exper­i­ence for all. 

Win-win.

The LTVA’s chal­lenge now is to devel­op mes­saging that both inspires vis­it­a­tion and com­mu­nic­ates beha­vi­our­al expect­a­tion without any hint of pat­ron­isa­tion. We are in a strong pos­i­tion to influ­ence beha­vi­or if we get the bal­ance and tone right. The pay­off is the sought-after stew­ard­ship of our over-loved places.

What do you think? Share a short anec­dote or com­ment below. Or write a deep­er “GT” Insight. The “Good Tour­ism” Blog wel­comes diversity of opin­ion and per­spect­ive about travel & tour­ism because travel & tour­ism is everyone’s business.

Fea­tured image (top of post): Sun­set over Lake Tahoe from South Lake Tahoe. Image by Rachid Dahnoun / Lake Tahoe Vis­it­ors Authority

About the author

Car­ol Chap­lin has lived in Lake Tahoe since 1982 and has been pres­id­ent & CEO of both the Lake Tahoe Vis­it­ors Author­ity (LTVA) and the Tahoe Douglas Vis­it­ors Author­ity (TDVA) since 2008. Under her lead­er­ship, the TDVA is con­struct­ing a 6,000-seat Events Cen­ter sched­uled to open in early 2023.

Before her VA lead­er­ship roles, Car­ol worked in hotel oper­a­tions, sales, mar­ket­ing, and attrac­tions. Cur­rently on the boards of the South Shore Trans­port­a­tion Man­age­ment Asso­ci­ation and the West­ern Nevada Devel­op­ment Dis­trict, Car­ol is also a former chair of the Reno Tahoe Air­port Author­ity Board of Trustees.