In a few weeks Springfield will welcome the Ohio Women’s Bowling Association conference and annual tournament.
And I mean “Welcome” with a capital “W”.
This conference and 13-weeks of tournaments will infuse nearly $1 million into our local economy, thanks to the more than 5,000 bowlers who will be attending the conference and competing in the weekend tournaments.
You might be surprised to know that the tourism industry is our largest employer – with about 4,500 individuals dependent upon visitors for their livelihood. So you can see why this is a huge win for our community.
The Convention and Visitors Bureau began working with the OWBA about three years ago to encourage them to bring their conference and tournament here. The CVB created a custom package for organizers, helped them with the arrangements, gave them a free overnight site tour package and agreed to pay for the lane monitors if the tournament came here.
Of course none of this could have happened without local OWBA members, such as Vickie Sibole, Springfield district WBA president, who were huge cheerleaders for Springfield and worked with the CVB to make the right connections and customize the package to make it attractive to organizers.
Thanks to Vickie and the other local representatives, more than $900,000 will be infused in our economy from the tournament, the hotel rooms, food, etc.
Regional and state conferences and events like these provide unlimited potential for us, especially since we now have additional conference space at the Hollenbeck-Bayley Creative Arts and Conference Center downtown.
If you belong to an organization that holds regional or state events, conferences or annual meetings, Chris Schutte or Kelly Mori at the CVB would love to meet with you about bringing that event to Greater Springfield.
You can contact them at CSchutte@greaterspringfield.com or KMori@greaterspringfield.com
You can also visit us on our Facebook page.
Have a great Chamber day!
