Conversation with Don Welsh, Destinations International: The Evolution of Tourism

Steve, how are you, my friend? I'm a delight. How are you? I love it.

I feel the same way now. I am in the Tetons in Wyoming. For how long? For this week.

And then next week we go to Yellowstone. So my 14-year-old niece is now with me full-time. So she's doing an online hybrid experiential school. I love it.

She'll learn about something, and then we'll go to Zion National Park or we'll go to dig up fossils somewhere. It's funny, I just got off a call with my team because we always try to figure out okay, what am I going to talk about during my first 15 minutes of a convention? But I told them, I said ironically, I kept this one thing. This was 2016, because everything I do was built around music, and that was Sting's New Day.

Because remember, things were in somewhat disarray when I got here. And this would be my 11th annual meeting, and we're quite a different organization and quite a different industry from when we started. What do you think the biggest differences are, both for the organization and for the industry? For the organization is digging out from a couple million dollars worth of financial mismanagement, lawsuits, and those kind of things.

So it took me really 16 to 17 to get that sort of fixed. And then once we got that behind us, we started building the answer to your question in two parts. One, when we went out and did our listening tour for the first couple years, and we talked to our members and the partners, and that allowed us to come back and really develop our mission statement and our four core values that have really not changed since then. And then once we myopically focused on those, we went from about three, four hundred members to now almost 837 countries.

So I think we began putting on a global lens on things. And we really have focused on when there's a need for research, we focused on that when there's a need for advocacy. And the other thing I would just think in terms of the change that I've seen from when I ran Seattle, Indianapolis, Chicago, the CEOs of today have to be so much more versed on the political landscape they operate with that. They've got to make sure that somehow everything they do is tied to their community.

Everything they do has got to be tied to the value system of that. And then they have to know the political landscape, and they have to become pretty good at financial management, too, because when there are funds available, we found out that elected leaders view tourism as a way where they can potentially redirect those funds. It's no longer about just heads and beds and butts and seats and those kind of things. It is strategically dissecting each segment and trying to does that align with your community and your assets.

Do you think that the typical CEO in a destination is equipped for that level of political acuity? No. Okay. What advice would you give to them?

You're seeing CEOs evolve to understand. And that's why I think they look to us, they look to industry associations, they look to their mentors who really may have a different perspective. I look at a couple of the CEOs right now who didn't come from our industry. I look at Walt Leger in New Orleans.

Walt was a city attorney. He knows the landscape there. He's learned this. I look at some of the more recent people coming into the industry.

I look at Steve Hill in Las Vegas. He wasn't from the industry. Yeah. You can go around, and I think right now, if they're astute learners, great.

But I also give a lot of credit to the CEOs of maybe next or a couple of generations earlier than me that have really understood and they've made that transition. They've understood their role. Hey, listen, no one's ever going to take away the performance of a destination, but it's how you achieve that with the community shared value and understanding those elements and understanding the political landscape. And I don't forget when Rahm Emanuel told me what I respectfully tried to tell him years ago, I don't report to you.

He looked at me and I won't say the words he used, but he said, your name says choose Chicago, you're the president, CEO, and I'm the mayor of Chicago. So I don't care who you report to me. So I think when you have it's a heavy responsibility, man. When you're responsible for a brand of a city that you live and work in, your family's there, it's it ain't for the make of heart.

No, not at all. What do you think the next generation of leaders is going to have as their big shift? I think clearly the continuation on responsible and sustainable travel, I think the continuation of community shared value, I think the understanding the global space that we work in and understand issues not just myopically focused on where they are, but how does the rest of the world impact what they're doing? And some recent discussions we've had, it's not like a lot of people that have said, you know what, I'm going to move up from that ladder.

I'm going to be a manager, a director, a VPA, an executive, and then the president. A lot of people are saying, you know what? I see what my president goes through on any day in terms of the responsibilities on his or her plate. I want to do my job and go home in the evening.

And I will tell you for most of the CEOs in their roles, there's no, you're not off the clock. Yeah. That's a big shift, I think, for younger people in general. I think clearly, let's face it, I think there have been generational shifts and probably in some cases long overdue.

But I think, and I'll probably just compare myself to that. Everything before with me was that that quote, if you could get it, work-life balance. And clearly I've been imbalanced my entire life, and all you need, I don't know whether you know it, but my wife passed away in October. It's it literally, if Gene were sitting here, she she'd probably say, Well, you know what, you never had that balance thing figured out to begin with.

But I think a lot of people have said, you know what? My work is my work. And if I'm really good at doing what I do when I perform my task, I can then have probably more time with my partner, with my spouse, with my kids, my family. And I, that is something I've really witnessed.

And those around me have made me a little bit more in tune with that. So yeah, I have a lot of dynamics. Do you think that the work from home culture has helped that in some way? I think the work in home culture has been both positive and to some degree uh a challenge.

And for my group, we're 100% remote, but we travel so much, we do so many events, we're together, right? And we see one another. And when we're not together in person, we're weekly team meetings and those kind of things. Where organizations that have a challenge right now is if you need to build a team culture and you don't have a frequency in being together, you can't do it remotely.

I think it's helped, and I think it's given a lot of people with maybe family obligations, flexibility in their schedule, if the schedule allows. But I think somehow you've seen organizations need to come back and balance the in-office, particularly. And the reality is if I represented a destination, is a pretty good probability I would be in there, if not four or five days a week. What do you hope to accomplish?

Continued financial stability of the organization, strategic growth domestically and globally, continued meeting our members' needs day in and day out, having some fun along the way, and celebrating our successes because we have a great team. And then leaving it, I know I'm leaving it in better shape than I inherited. That's it. You've mentioned a couple times the international because right now, if you look at DI right now, it will be probably right around 800 total DMOs by the time we get to Portland.

Right now we're about 650 US, 70 in Canada, 30 in Europe, a handful in the Middle East, Saudi Tourism Authority, and hopefully others. And then it's a spattering around the rest of the world. There's some in Asia. But if you look at the bulk of the organization, the biggest question the board is asking is can we have sustained growth outside of the U.

S. and Canada? We used to say the Americas, but we've had the last two presidents in Mexico literally defund, which was one of the most successful tourism organizations. We have a handful of members are now in Mexico.

But yeah, we have to figure out with 38 full-time employees, we can't be everything, we have limited bandwidth. We have to be cautious of that's probably the biggest challenge the board has asked of me and our team. And we'll be working on a very detailed strategic plan the next 18 months. I think the challenges, too, that destinations are facing here in the states versus even in Canada or Europe are drastically different.

There was an episode of CBS Sunday morning, and they had a segment on over tourism, and it's exclusively focused on Europe. I saw that. And I think right now, when you look at, I was just in Italy two weeks ago, and you look at the crowds, and it was early May, and you think about the crowds, what it's going to be like in the peak travel season. There are already lines around the block at the Vatican.

There are already lines at Treby Pound, and you couldn't get near it. And then you see what steps have been taking, like in Venice, where you're going to pay a daily fee to go if you're not on the island. It's a real legitimate issue. Accessible travel is very important too because we have an aging population around the world.

How are we going to continue to work to make destinations more accessible, particularly destinations that have geographic challenges? To get around now, cobblestone streets or maybe limited eating. Let's face it, the ADA is not global. How does somebody maneuver if they've got some form of a handicap?

I think of people that are on a spectrum and trying to communicate, even in your own language, in your native language, and then amplify that by going overseas, going to a different country. No, totally. It never stops. It it maybe it ebbs and flows.

It will go to different countries. Clearly, we're having some challenges right now that are causing people to rethink. We know we're down significantly a visitation from Canada to the U.S.

, almost 60% coming across the border right now. I don't know when and if that will turn around. It's in our DNA. We're not going to stop traveling.

I think people will go to great lengths if there's financial challenges to save their money and do whatever they've got to do to take that weekly vacation during the summer. Because it's tradition, right? A lot of families are really struggling right now. And travel is critically important, I think, to expand our horizons.

And from my own idealistic standpoint, I think it's travel is going to be the only way we're going to culturally break down some of these barriers. Oh, yeah. And the only way you're going to realize is travel the way we do. And when you realize travel's the equalizer.

You realize those people love their families and love their time together and love having meal. You see that. And I think sometimes we think of other parts of the world as the language may differ. The reality of travel motor people is the equalizer.

Yeah. The more differences, the more similar we are. Yep. Without a doubt.

What is your summer family vacation looking like? My summer right now is the get-through. I'm traveling, to be honest with you. I told my exec team when Gene passed and I decided to stay a little extra.

I say, you know what? Listen, if I can do a trip for you that happened to have younger children or teenagers do that, they took me up on it. So I'll probably be so Steve, my goal will be once we get to an annual convention in Portland, that I put my feet up somewhere uh in a lake or an ocean, and I'm not going anywhere for uh period of time. I go see my grandkids in Tampa and Chicago.

Nice. How old are they now? They what two, three? The boys are two and a half, and they live in Tampa.

And my Veronica is a year old, celebrated her birthday. Matter of fact, her birthday was yesterday. Very nice. What do you love most about being a grandpa?

Because I traveled so much when they were young in the hotel business. I got some friends of mine that worked at Weston Ritz Carlton and elsewhere. In our minds, we didn't think we were gone as much as we were. And when our spouses or partners would get together and say, Well, what the hell are you talking about?

You weren't there. And in your mind, somehow convince yourself, I think the coolest thing is just their my time with them. It's just it's to the point where my daughter said, Hey, how's it feel to be a first-time parent? A little that's a little twist of knife.

What's something you'd like to learn this year? Anything? Hobby? I'd like I'd like to learn legitimately another language to the point where other than just keywords, that I can speak it.

I love Italy. My mom is from Italy originally, and I'd like to learn eventually Italian. And I'd like to I love to cook. And I'm an okay cook without having any quote formal training, but I would like to, and probably Italy fits there as well.

By the way, it's funny you ask, what do I want to learn this year? I want to learn what it's going to be like when I'm not working at DI and whether I truly can have a hobby or hobbies. Because right now my hobbies are listening to music, eating, and drinking good wine. But that can't be a hobby.

I can literally say, you know what, I gotta have some legitimate hobbies. My uncle retired at the beginning of this year, and he is spending four days every week watching his grandkids. When I ran the boys, Veronica, time flies. I was letting me always enjoy our conversations.

It's more like having a conversation. Yeah, it's interesting looking back on it's hard to believe I'm into my 11th year. When I looked at this and I'm saying, shit, I'm gone to my 11th year, and all of a sudden we looked at the math where we've been. No wonder I'm so tired.

What's been your greatest accomplishment? Or what are you most proud of? Other than my kids, my family, I'm proud of the fact we've made this organization viable. It was not viable.

It was not. I'm proud of the fact that it was a whole team effort that came together to a lot of people had the vision what BI could be or DMAI at the time. And between a whole lot of people, a lot of members, partners, board members, we had a belief what this organization could be, and I think we're getting there. What advice would you have for say the next generation of leaders?

Maybe the person who fills your shoes after you're gone. I think the one thing that I have brought to this role is all my years of traveling globally. I think whoever comes in this role has got to have a global understanding that it can't be North American or U.S.

centric. It's got to understand its role in this ecosystem of tourism. And they have to, I think within our group, you got to lead by example. And you got to get out there and get after it, support our members and support our partners and be visible and present.

One of the things I like most about the destination industry is that people understand the rising tide lifts all boats. You do. And there's not that fight over the slice of pie when we can all work together to increase the pie. And that's global.

As much as it is domestic. And it's just because the opportunity for those people to learn in their vertical is growing exponentially. And every one of those ones I just said, 50% or more of the people on there are first timers. Which is pretty wild.

That's been now for the last two years. So the next generation of people coming up are now beginning to understand this community and how DI can be their community. When we first talked, I have not met a CEO in the tourism space, the destination space, that had intentionally worked their career to be in the tourism space. Since then, and we're about 300 interviews in now, I have found four.

And of those four, two have been in the last three months. Yeah, it's pretty interesting. College they wanted to get into tourism. They knew in college they wanted to get into destination work.

Do you think that's a trend that's going to all continue? I think one of the things that's helping is we have been somewhat of a stealth industry. And to the credit of Jack Johnson two years ago, Jack said, you know what? We need to do we need that professionals for our industry.

We need to write about what the industry does. This past year, Mark Carney wrote a great letter of support out of Canada. We have support from the United States, governors, and others, because a lot of people don't know we're not at the job fairs. We're not at the college fairs with these kids coming out.

The ones coming out of the traditional tourism schools, Cornell, Michigan, whatever it may be, they're being heavily recruited by the hotel industry, the rental car industry, the restaurant industry, right? And a lot of people find their way to us in a rather secure manner. Like me. Yeah.

Airline, hotel, DMO space, individual now association. So I did not find this industry, but it's funny the people now that are coming here, they cannot envision themselves going back to where they came from. Could you ever envision yourself going back to where you came from? No, no, to be honest with you.

I think the hotel industry has changed forever. It's the commoditization of a lot of factors in tourism, not just the hotels. Or when effort and interest is put onto the quarterly return, that we're not investing in innovation. We're not investing in people for the business, what's good for the industry in the long run.

No, we're not. And I think there's certain companies that do that, and certain hotels that do that. There's no license, there's no freedom, there's no incentive for them to build better experiences. Look at the reality.

Look what we're down to now in terms of airline choices in the United States. Think about it. There used to be 10 or 12 of them, right? Now we got America, United Delta, and Southwest.

We got the core. And then we got all these other little small players, the allegiance, the breezes, those. And guess what? What's something else you want to talk about on the podcast?

I think we've covered our normal wide range of topics to make it somewhat entertaining and fun and free-flowing. Appreciate it. Anything you want to ask me? What do you want to hear from me?

What as somebody who does this for a living and runs this association, what's important to you? Accessibility. You mentioned accessibility earlier. To us, accessibility means two things.

It means providing people with the tools to meet them where they're at, whether that be a ramp, a translation, uh stimulus controlled experiences, whatever that accessibility, that accommodation might be. The other thing with accessibility is when and where. Being available when and where people need it. And that applies to an association.

Being present in the European space when the Europeans are having so many problems or so many challenges with destinations or the Asian market or Africa, which is still developing, and maintaining that presence. So for them to get a visa to come to the US right now is almost impossible. I know. I know.

And we have people that want to sign up and take the CDME, or they want to sign up and take this, that, or the other thing. But they can't with the way things are structured presently. And I think that's an opportunity for us as an industry to rethink a lot of what we do and to continue working on making things accessible for people, how, when, and where. I think right now Jeff Freeman and I are good friends, as Fred and I are.

And I would say if Jeff, to his credit, has done everything he can to continue to be diplomatic and continue to maintain a level of decorum. That's why I think our work right now has never been more timely and relevant. 42% of the respondents in our last futures study said funding is now of their top issues. They have to deal with sustained funding.

And that requires advocacy. That requires them to be able to tell their story intelligently to their stakeholders, to their elected leaders. As of this last week, we have 65 destinations that are working with us. Which, compared to almost any tourism or hospitality program in the world, that makes us one of the largest.

And it's humbling. I'd say it's you've got a grassroots approach. You've gone oh yeah, bottom up. And I think rather than trying to push it down, you've been diverse in your business, you've been inclusive.

And I think that's why people will participate and want to have conversations. There was a I just finished reading Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Gerard, who worked for Danny Myers. One of the things that he said is pick worthy rivals. Great.

And for me to be my own rival, to be better today than it was yesterday, yeah. I think we stay very focused, very humble, but we are very intent. We never take our foot off the paddle. You can't sometimes put on your blinders.

Just gotta ignore them, otherwise, it just got to be. No one's got a magic solution to these complex issues, but if you stay after it long enough, you can figure out how you're gonna maneuver. Yeah. A lot of people have a tendency, I think, when they hit issues in life, go, oh my god, I I can't fix this.

Everything's fixable if you're willing to invest in time to fix for the most part. And to your question about what I hope to get from the conversation, I hope to be, like I said, a better person today than I was yesterday, and to learn from everybody who's out there who's been through it. Your time, your leadership, your insight, your candor has been really helpful to me personally. So I thank you for that.

My pleasure. You want to rock and roll? Rock and roll. I can't play the guitar, but I can bake a cake and a dishwasher in this bus.

Don't feel bad for me at a campground. You can't never feel sorry for you. It's always a beautiful read out my window. All right, sir.

I'm gonna let you go because I'm sure you've got something else lined up after this one. Yeah, no worries. You're a delight. Thank you.

I appreciate you. My pleasure. Appreciate you, Steve. Enjoy this conversation.

All right, bye-bye. Oh, you mean we've done oh yeah, we're done. And I thought we were ready to rock and roll. Oh no, we got ourselves.

We'll definitely clean it up. And there's a few points there, but it's nothing. I did want to say one thing about my my my role now, 11 years into it. Go for it.

It's funny as we talked about in our last conversation. In my wildest imagination, first of all, I didn't think I'd be in the DMO space, let alone having the privilege of leading the association. And every day I think those of us who work in a city or a state or whatever the role may be, we take great pride. We do it.

I've never been more humbled into my 11th year now to do what I do. I still love what I do. I have a great team around me, both the DI team and a great unwavering support with our board and our committees and all the great work that the foundation does. And that plays a critical role.

I think you have to, in this day and age, love what you do and really have the joy that goes along with the job. 11 years into it, I still feel that way. If you love what you do, you can't call it work. The trade.