Tourism exec heading to larger market in Green Bay

The tools of destination marketing handed to Amie Burrill when she came to the Burnsville Convention and Visitors Bureau in August 2006 have been largely discarded.

The bureau, which now goes by the name Experience Burnsville, no longer has a 1-800 number with information about hotels and attractions. Ad buys in magazines and newspapers are few. After COVID, the bureau decided that representing at trade shows didn’t bring enough return on investment.

Another thing has changed since Burrill was hired as executive director: Burnsville has nine hotels instead of 10, after the whimsical FantaSuite Hotel closed years ago.

After 20 years of promoting the city’s lodging industry, Burrill is leaving to do the same in the larger market of Green Bay, Wisconsin. She’ll begin as vice president of sales for Discover Green Bay on Sept. 8.

“Her skills, experience and capacities maybe exceeded the size of our operation,” said Dan McElroy, a former Experience Burnsville board member who finished his service last year. “She’s really done a good job.”

The Discover Green Bay region has 5,000 hotel rooms compared with Burnsville’s 870. The organization has 12 full-time staffers and six part-timers.

In Burnsville, Burrill is a staff of one, though it wasn’t always that way. Funded by a 3% room tax and contracted by the city to promote lodging, the nonprofit bureau had staffs of two or three until the COVID pandemic, Burrill said.

“It’s an industry that continues to evolve, regardless of the challenges, be it a recession, a pandemic, government relations, whatever it is,” said Burrill, who was small-business manager for the Minneapolis Regional Chamber of Commerce before coming to Burnsville. “It’s always evolving, and we get to be nimble and change with the times.”

Burnsville hotels have largely bounced back from COVID’s damper on business and leisure travel, she said. But staff cuts at Experience Burnsville remained.

“It was best for our organization and the destination to not bring back staff right after COVID, and we fortunately found a way to make things happen, and it’s been working for us for six years now,” Burrill said.

Experience Burnsville has a $354,740 budget this year, with an expected $300,000 in room taxes. That’s a slight dip from $313,720 in room taxes at the end of last year but well ahead of the $260,000 that was forecast for 2025.

“Being a destination management executive is always a dynamic position,” said McElroy, a former president and CEO of Hospitality Minnesota and a former Burnsville mayor. “And she’s been through it, and she’s handled it well.”

The Experience Burnsville website and social media are the chief marketing vehicles now, Burrill said. The target audience is at least 50 miles outside the Burnsville area.

“I like to say that Burnsville has lodging for a wide variety,” she said. “Whether you’re looking for a full-service hotel or limited service, Burnsville has it.”

The city has one full-service hotel, the Wyndham Minneapolis South/Burnsville (formerly the Holiday Inn Burnsville). The Hampton Inn Minneapolis/Burnsville is still open but was slated to become a drug and alcohol treatment center after a 3-2 City Council vote last October allowing the conversion.

“We’re very welcoming to budgets of all sizes, from a single traveler to a group tour to a family of five that want to hit up the local attractions,” Burrill said.

Though Burnsville has been “very good to me,” she’s looking forward to handling fewer administrative duties as a one-person operation and unleashing more creativity in Green Bay.

“I miss collaboration,” Burrill said. “I miss working with a team.”

Source: Hometownsource.com