Jasper’s Destination Marketing Organization is increasing the fee it levies on visitors.

Added onto every bill hotel guests receive at the end of their stay, and onto many of the cheques that diners in Jasper get at the conclusion of their meal, is a two percent Destination Marketing Fee (DMF). On a $100 dinner, for example, over and above the $5 GST hit, $2 is charged for Jasper’s DMF. Since the incorporation of Tourism Jasper in 2009, anyone staying at Jasper hotels or shopping and dining with Tourism Jasper member businesses pay the two percent DMF.

Come January 1, 2024, that fee will increase to three percent of the bill. 

Mayor Richard Ireland noted the hike during municipal budget discussions on Tuesday, November 28. 

“That is a 50 per cent increase,” Ireland said. 

Ireland was suggesting that if only municipal leaders had a similar consumption-based tool at their disposal, they could raise revenues without relying so heavily on property taxes, which he called “probably the worst way” to fund a municipality.

Driving demand

On the contrary, a Destination Marketing Fee is evidently the best way to fund a Destination Marketing Organization (DMO). Tourism Jasper’s 2023 budget was $5 million, but in 2025, TJ’s outgoing President and CEO, James Jackson, estimates that number will swell to $7 million‚ and not because the DMO’s Travel Alberta funding, federal grants, event-related revenues or partnership with Parks Canada are anticipated to grow exponentially. It’s instead all about the DMF: in 2022 it brought in $3.5 million, accounting for the bulk of the organization’s revenues and representing a 26 percent increase from the $2.6 million it achieved in 2021, according to Tourism Jasper. 

“[The DMF] ensures the organization has the resources to create value for shareholders by driving demand when they, and the destination, could most use it,” Jackson said.

An extra percentile on the DMF will allow the organization to continue its dual revenue growth mandates: “Defend” summer, and increase visitation during winter and the shoulder seasons—with the objective of achieving an average of 80 percent annual occupancy by 2027. For comparison, in 2023, Jasper’s average annual occupancy was about 70 percent, Jackson said. But because summer in Jasper is full to bursting, there’s no room to grow there—hence the expressed focus on the winter and shoulder seasons. 

“We acknowledge the pressure summer puts on the destination,” Jackson added.

Not an impediment

In the winter, for many businesses in Jasper, it’s a different kind of pressure. Jackson said inconsistent visitation equates to inconsistent earnings, which contributes to a hire-in-the-spring, lay-off-in-the-fall cycle—a boom/bust pattern which Jackson says isn’t healthy.

“We want stability, we want people to be employed, we want monthly earnings to be consistent,” he said. 

As such, Tourism Jasper’s shareholders have given the organization and its staff instructions to continue to grow “in a manner that’s complimentary to the destination, while dealing with in-destination programming and management.” And to help them do that, they’ve decreed that the DMO’s members collect another visitor dollar on every hundred spent—a charge that Jackson said is par for the course among travel destinations.

“It is not an impediment to the visitor,” Jackson insisted.

Moreover, the DMF bump will ultimately be a benefit to residents, Tourism Jasper says. Investing in the winter/shoulder season helps gives front line staff the hours they need, and a better-resourced DMO can better fulfil its in-destination missions—namely visitor-oriented programming, community investment, and leadership initiatives such as their recently unveiled Destination Stewardship Plan. Jackson said Tourism Jasper spends approximately $1 million in the community—primarily on events, but on a number of smaller initiatives as well.

“It’s about a mutually-beneficial visitor economy.” 

Unapologetically wild

Those visitors come from all over the world, of course, but they don’t come out of thin air. Tourism Jasper spends about $500,000 reaching its core international markets (the United Kingdom, Germany, Holland and Australia) and emerging markets (Japan, South Korea, Mexico, France and India). The DMO spends about $1 million to market the destination regionally, and about half of that to attract visitors from “long haul” Canada. Half a million is also dedicated to marketing Jasper to the U.S., and this year that spend includes a winter campaign to showcase Jasper as “one of the last bastions of ski culture.” 

“The USP [unique selling point] here is that we’re unapologetically wild,” Jackson said.

Buying in

When they do arrive in Jasper, those guests may indeed discover Jasper is unapologetically wild, but they’ll also find an unapologetic DMF on more of the businesses they patronize than if they visited in years previous. That’s because Tourism Jasper’s membership has grown—from 53 members in 2017, to 69 today. And no longer is the DMO made up exclusively of hotels and restaurants. With a structure that allows for retail-affiliate members—who don’t charge a DMF per se but build a contribution to the DMO into their business—plus a handful of outlier businesses such as independent guides, theatre companies and even a live acrobatic entertainment group, more local companies are buying what Tourism Jasper is selling. And that includes an increase to the DMF.

“We are deeply invested in this community,” Jackson said. “We’re doing everything we can to create value.”

Bob Covey // bob@thejasperlocal.com