CHICAGO (WLS) — Final spring, Lynn Osmond grew to become the brand new President and CEO of Select Chicago, the town’s tourism arm.

She stepped into the function two years into the pandemic, which had a huge effect on the town’s hospitality trade.

In line with Select Chicago, greater than 60 million vacationers visited the town in 2019. That fell to fewer than 17 million in 2020. As we wrap up 2022, we’re taking a look at how these numbers are rebounding and what’s forward for 2023.

“Properly we had a superb summer season. We had a few 90% restoration charge in the summertime,” Osmond stated. “The motels had been packed, the streets had been full, the sights had been busy. And this fall we’re really doing very effectively. We’ll most likely finish the yr someplace round 82% of 2019, and 2019 was probably the most profitable yr that we would ever had.”

She stated that is 9 million room nights had been crammed. Her hope is that 2025 would be the remaining yr that we come out of the pandemic tourism losses.

As for a way the restoration has come about, “Properly there are two arms that we actually deal with, getting conventions to return and we have had a really profitable yr with that as a result of we had a number of conventions that had been already booked,” Osmond stated. “After which we had just a few of them that needed to reschedule from the COVID years. And they also had been again. So we had a number of conventions coming again, their numbers had been very robust. They had been taking a look at as excessive as 80-85 % restoration lots of them. And in order that was nice to see them coming again. Then with leisure, we have actually had a number of dynamism with leisure and actually pushing the town, its unbelievable structure, its lakefront, its positioning. We had greatest massive metropolis for the sixth yr in a row by Conde Nast Traveler. However actually speaking about all we have now to supply, the cultural sights, the sports activities, the eating places, it is simply actually an thrilling place to be.”

In 2023, one of many first massive occasions is Chicago Restaurant Week which begins January 20 and runs for 2 weeks. It can characteristic greater than 300 of the town’s prime eating places.

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