New tourism CEO says he was ‘designed for’ industry

Hamilton County is not lacking for tourists.

Last year, the county attracted 6 million visitors—two-thirds of whom came from out-of-state—who spent $1 billion locally. A decade earlier, in 2013, 2.2 million visitors spent $310 million. Now, the new chief cheerleader for Hamilton County’s tourism industry is looking to take business to the next level.

Hamilton County Tourism Inc. this month named David West as its next CEO. West, a 27-year veteran of the tourism marketing industry, replaces Brenda Myers, who led Hamilton County Tourism for 19 years before her retirement this year.

Hamilton County Tourism is a nonprofit with 27 employees that promotes tourism within the county and provides grants to tourism-based organizations.

“I give Harry Potter references like, ‘I’m a purebred, not a muggle,’” West said. “I didn’t fall into this industry. I was designed for this industry.”

West’s resume includes stops as director of marketing for the Bucks County (Pennsylvania) Conference and Visitors Bureau; vice president of marketing for the Pocono Mountains Visitor Bureau; vice president of travel for the Michigan Economic Development Corp., where he managed the state’s “Pure Michigan” marketing campaign; and director of tourism and economic development marketing for Philadelphia-based i76 Solutions.

He most recently worked for seven years as executive director of destination marketing for Atlanta-based Herschend Family Entertainment, whose portfolio includes Dollywood Parks & Resorts in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee; Kentucky Kingdom in Louisville, Kentucky; and the Newport Aquarium just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati.

“David has a proven track record of driving success and spearheading transformative marketing campaigns for a number of destinations,” Conner Prairie CEO and Hamilton County Tourism Board Chair Norman Burns said in written remarks. “With his expertise and leadership skills, David is well equipped to lead Hamilton County Tourism into its next era of growth and innovation.”

West said Hamilton County will present a different kind of challenge—one he is looking for at this point in his career.

“The more I learned about Hamilton County, the more it was like, they’re so passionate about the growth of tourism in this county that it really just spoke to me,” West said. “And the more I learned, the more I liked it, and the more we talked, the more we liked each other.”

As he settles into the job, West said, his first goal is to get to know people across the county. Then, he will look at opportunities for the county’s existing tourism spots, such as Ruoff Music Center in Noblesville, Grand Park Sports Campus in Westfield and the Carmel Arts & Design District. His third goal will be to study economic development opportunities and work to attract more visitors from major cities around the Midwest, like Chicago and Detroit.

West added that developing the county’s tourism brand will be a key, with 10 Hamilton counties in the United States.

“How can we move the needle in Hamilton County for visitors?” he said. “The ultimate goal is to create overnight visitation and just pure tourism [in] the area.”

Tourism is one of the most important factors in growing Hamilton County’s economy, said Jack Russell, president of OneZone, the joint chamber of commerce for Carmel and Fishers.

“I would put it up there with schools, public safety and infrastructure,” he said.

Period of growth

West’s move to Hamilton County comes at a time when some of the county’s most high-profile attractions are either expanding or planning to grow.

Conner Prairie in Fishers, which had more than 366,000 visitors last year, is transforming its welcome center as part of a $33 million project that will give the building a new name, the Museum Experience Center, and add immersive exhibit spaces, access to collection items, and hands-on learning and play. The living-history museum is also working on a 20-year plan to expand across the White River into Carmel with its “Conservation Campus.”

Westfield leaders are plotting a 10-year plan to develop an entertainment and recreation district around Grand Park Sports Campus and make the area a year-round tourism destination with amenities such as retail, housing, hotels, gathering spaces, a boardwalk with a canal, and an indoor ski facility. The 400-acre Grand Park had 1.3 million unique visitors out of a total of 5.5 million visits in 2023.

This year, Carmel’s Palladium received nearly $1.5 million in audio and lighting upgrades in an effort to bring more acts to the 1,600-seat Italian Renaissance-style performance hall. Since 2011, the Center for the Performing Arts has served more than 1.5 million ticketed patrons and held more than 3,500 performances at the Palladium, the 500-seat Tarkington and the 200-seat Studio Theatre.

The Fishers Event Center, which will open Nov. 22, has already sold more than 38,000 tickets to concerts, comedy shows and other touring events, not including the sports teams that will call the arena home, Mayor Scott Fadness said last month. The $170 million event center is part of Fishers District, which draws people to the area near Interstate 69, between 106th and 116th streets, with its restaurants, shops and hotels.

“I think what you’re going to see over the next five years is the transformation of this area. That’s why we built it the way we did,” Fadness said. “This is going to be a catalyst for world-class development, in the scale of hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars of development.”

Hotel growth is also happening throughout the county. Carmel-based Pedcor is looking to expand the 122-room Hotel Carmichael by making 33 suites under construction at the neighboring The Wren building part of the hotel.

South Korea-based Lotte Hotels & Resorts plans to expand its presence in the United States with a five-story, high-end L7 Westfield hotel with 215 rooms near the intersection of U.S. 31 and 161st Street.

And new mixed-use developments, such as Fishers District and the proposed Proscenium III in Carmel, have hotels included in plans.

“When we look at economic development now, what probably wasn’t there five years ago is, how do we add a hotel component, a tourism component, to some of these developments?” Russell said. “I think all of these cities have realized now that hotels are a part of these multiuse developments.”

With so many individual attractions throughout Hamilton County, West said the next step will be to “weave” them together and connect the dots to keep people in town longer. Last year, 75.7% of all visitors to Hamilton County stayed at least one night, according to Hamilton County Tourism.

It’s a philosophy West used at Herschend Family Entertainment when he worked to make Dollywood a stopping place in east Tennessee for tourists visiting the Smoky Mountains and attractions in Gatlinburg and Sevierville.

“You can’t have somebody be here for two or three days and just be in one town. They’re going to have to do more,” West said. “Our challenge is, how to take a great tournament at Grand Park and [help visitors there also] experience Carmel or experience Fishers or experience Noblesville?”

Jeff McDermott, CEO of the Center for the Performing Arts, said all attractions and venues in Hamilton County benefit when leaders work together to gain visitors.

“We can’t provide all the arts entertainment in this county, nor can any other venue by itself,” he said. “While I think there’s some healthy competition, I think there’s also a regionalism attitude that is beneficial to all communities and all these various entertainment-type of facilities and venues.”

River and rural

Russell pointed to the White River as a largely untapped tourism resource for Hamilton County. He wants to look at the ways cities like Cincinnati, Louisville and Des Moines, Iowa, have used rivers to draw people and dollars.

In 2019, community leaders unveiled the White River Vision Plan, which detailed how the waterway could be preserved and developed through Marion and Hamilton counties.

“If we want to catch up to some of these Midwest cities that are doing some pretty incredible things, it’s our job now to really invest heavily in the river,” Russell said.

West also noted that the Monon Trail and the White River connect Hamilton County to Indianapolis, and that the county can leverage both more.

“The Monon Trail [and the river are] what connects us,” he said. “And so you have both of these great byways that connect the two, and I think that becomes the heart of Indiana.”

Russell pointed to potential for growth in ag tourism in northern Hamilton County.

“The possibilities are endless because it’s a unique niche that’s not available right now in our four cities,” he said.

Hamilton County Commissioner Mark Heirbrandt expects ag tourism to take off along the U.S. 31 corridor where the county is building a $65 million water and sewer district, particularly near Cicero and Jackson Township.

“The only reason that [development] hasn’t expanded in a faster growth mode is because they didn’t have capacity for water and sewer there,” Heirbrandt said.

He also noted recent upgrades to Roberts Settlement, a historic community built by free Black residents in the 19th century in Atlanta, and the 750-acre Strawtown Koteewi Park, which offers hiking and equestrian trails, zip-lining, a canoe launch, fishing, a natural history center and an archeological exhibit.

Heirbrandt also suggested growth in Westfield could lead to a water park in northern Hamilton County.

“We’ve had some interest because of Grand Park and what that might be able to bring,” he said. “Kids are always looking for something else to do, and we’ve been approached by some firms about that.”

West likewise said he could see something like a Great Wolf Lodge indoor water park resort being built north of Westfield.

“There’s really nothing to fix,” West said. “It’s more like, how can we keep the foot on the gas?”•