SALUDA, N.C. — North Carolina is the sixth most-visited state in the country, according to Visit North Carolina. The tourism industry generates more than $26 billion each year, but a decrease in travel due to the pandemic caused 2020 to be a rough year.

What You Need To Know

  • N.C. tourism generates $26 billion yearly

  • State's tourism industry lost $10 billion in 2020

  • Tourism industry employs 500,000 people

Gorge Canopy Zipline Tour has experienced the changes as a result of the pandemic firsthand. The tour is a popular destination for visitors of western North Carolina. It's open year round and hosts more than a dozen tours a day with about 10 zipliners per tour.

But in 2020, the pandemic shed a few months from the company’s schedule.

“We were closed for two months. We took that time to think about our operations and look at what we needed to change. On May 23, we reopened and implemented smaller trip sizes,” Tour Guide Rachel Kish says.

Before COVID-19, about 150 people would zip through the course daily. Now, that number has been cut in half. It’s a scenario seen across the state as tourists numbers dropped, and consequently so did tourism dollars.

“We’ve had natural disasters that’s impacted us, but never something that’s impacted the entire state and entire industry all at once,” Director of Visit North Carolina Wit Tuttell says.

Visit North Carolina estimates the state’s tourism industry lost more than $10 billion in 2020.

”Our biggest impact was actually business travel. Business travel stopped, meetings and conventions and sporting events which are big draws," he says.

Outdoor leisure businesses like The Gorge have faired slightly better as more and more people found other ways to spend their time during the pandemic. But in order for the tourism industry to bounce back, not only tourists are needed, but North Carolinians exploring their own state is just as important.

”I think there are still about 100,000 tourism employees out of work right now, and we want to get them back," Tuttell says.

The state’s tourism industry employs about 500,000 people, but if the industry continues to see the pandemic’s impact this year, the state could see a spike in unemployment for workers in that industry.