You can pretty much throw them out the window.
North Texas’ weeklong weather whipping is blunting the economic bonanza from Super Bowl XLV.
The White Bluff Resort on Lake Whitney, about 70 miles south of Cowboys Stadium, and a sister property, The Cliffs Resort at Possum Kingdom Lake, had banked on bringing in more than $60,000 in sales this week from the Super Bowl and unrelated group business.
Instead, both resorts were shuttered Friday and the general manager of one was in intensive care with broken ribs and a punctured lung after taking a tumble on the ice at The Cliffs.
“We’ve never had a weeklong impact of snow weather,” said Lauren Dunnaway, director of sales for the White Bluff Resort, adding that both properties were closed to protect guests and employees.
“That definitely is affecting the bottom line,” she said.
Ditto for other hoteliers, as well as restaurateurs, golf courses and others who had been angling for a piece of the big game’s multimillion-dollar pie.
“Dallas is going to miss out on a lot of additional revenue I’m sure it was taking into account,” said Robert Tuchman, a sports business analyst and author of The 100 Sporting Events You Must See Live.
The projections are for the most part voodoo economics, so any projection of loss based on them is inherently flawed as well. But these losses are very real, and most unfortunate for the business owners, the local governments, and the state. It’s easy and fun to heckle the Dallas Arlington North Texas Super Bowl extravaganza, but I wouldn’t wish this on anyone. Hopefully the somewhat warmer weekend weather helped them regain a bit of what they missed out on.
For what it’s worth, there’s apparently plenty of party action elsewhere in the state, and around the country. This is being viewed as a positive economic indicator for the year, as folks are buying more than just snacks for the first time in awhile. Probably not much of a consolation to North Texas, but good news anyway.
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