City leaders surprised by Nacogdoches hotel-motel occupancy rates: ‘Not as dreadful as they could be’

NACOGDOCHES, Texas (KTRE) - City leaders in Nacogdoches discussed the ‘not-so dreadful’ drop in the hotel-motel occupancy rate in the city, signaling that COVID-19 had much less of an impact on tourism than previously thought.

During the Nacogdoches Community Stakeholders Teleconference on Tuesday, the Nacogdoches Convention and Visitors Bureau reported that in March, the number of heads in beds was down 21 percent.

Leaders were expecting the rate to triple for April. Instead, the numbers left city leaders pleasantly surprised.

“And for the month of April, when everything was fully shut down, we were down 41 percent over April 2019," said Sherry Chaney Morgan, director of Nacogdoches CVB. "And while both of these numbers are dreadful, they are not as dreadful as they could be.”

Morgan also noted the number of tourists visiting Nacogdoches CVB picked up since it opened up almost four weeks ago.

Copyright 2020 KTRE. All rights reserved.