tourism

It’s too early to tell how many out-of-towners will come to the city for Pope Benedict XVI’s visit, but everyone from pedicab drivers to butchers are clamoring for a piece of the pope-tourism pie.

Though only 57,000 tickets are available for the pontiff’s mass at Yankee Stadium, the city’s official tourism company NYC & Co. is expecting “people from around the country, and international visitors, to come and experience the papal visit as well,” said agency spokesperson Tiffany Townsend.

In anticipation of the hordes, all kinds of businesses are whipping out pope-related products or deals to appeal to the devoutly Catholic. Or devoutly kitsch.  read more »

Jonathan Tisch, your New York Giants just won the Super Bowl! What are you going to do now?

"It's time to move on," Mr. Tisch told the Times on Sunday, announcing that he's stepping down as chairman of NYC & Company, the city's tourism agency.

The 54-year-old co-owner of the Giants and CEO of the Loews Hotels chain, whose properties include the 353-room Regency at 540 Park Avenue, helped spearhead efforts to resuscitate the city's wounded tourism industry after the September 11 terrorist attacks.

Besides winning the Super Bowl, Mr. Tisch can also boast of attaining an all-time-high annual tourism level of 46.3 million visitors in 2007.  read more »

A breakdown of the city's latest tourism estimates suggests that Britons (1.46 million), Canadians (880,000), and Germans (470,000) comprised the biggest crowds of international visitors to New York in 2007.

Numbers were up among all groups last year -- including the roughly 300,000 residents of Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg, weirdly categorized as "BeNeLux" -- except for one, the Japanese.  read more »

"We are incredibly grateful for the weak dollar," quipped George Fertitta, head of the city's tourism office NYC & Company.

Mr. Fertitta joined Deputy Mayor for Economic Development Robert Lieber in crediting "beneficial exchange rates" for boosting tourism to record levels in 2007.

An estimated 46 million total travelers visited New York last year, contributing some $28 billion to the local economy, according to the city's latest projections, which officials presented at a press conference at Pier 88 on Sunday alongside the docked Queen Victoria cruise ship.  read more »

Tomorrow is the last chance to view what could possibly be the creepiest advertising campaign to hit Manhattan in recent memory, the world's largest snowglobe in Bryant Park.

Live actors dressed in ice-hockey, ski, and snow-boarding gear have been holed up in the two-story tall vinyl dome that's 20 feet in diameter since Friday to promote tourism in Ontario.  read more »