Grow Like a Local: Tourism Companies Are Rooted in Anchorage

In today’s travel landscape, visitors are increasingly seeking meaningful, personal connections in the destinations they hope to explore. Instead of sticking to traditional tours or “one-size-fits-all” itineraries, travelers are looking for ways to immerse themselves in the authentic character of a place. Traveling with an eye for the true nature of a destination isn’t a new idea, but the appetite for local products and genuine experiences is growing stronger. More people want to travel with intention and attention, hoping to engage with the people, flavors, and traditions that define a community.

Consumer Demand

There is an insatiable appetite for Alaska products, authentic experiences, and connections with residents. Produce grown a short drive from the restaurant, a guide who grew up in Anchorage and has lived here all their life, taking a hike the way a resident would on a weekend.

“Visitors want to experience Anchorage the way we do,” said Julie Saupe, Visit Anchorage President & CEO. “We see high demand from travelers to live like residents, eat the same foods, understand what our place is about. Luckily, Anchorage is equipped to offer all things local. We just have to preserve and nurture what comes to us naturally.”

Local Landscape

With charismatic megafauna, Chugach Mountain backdrops, and glacier-studded escapes nearby, place is front and in Anchorage. But locally grown businesses, products, and experiences, and a dynamic city scene are what set it apart from other places with similar access to parklands.

While tourism might conjure hotel towers and big ships, Anchorage’s industry landscape is refreshingly homegrown. Larger hotels like the Hotel Captain Cook and The Wildbirch Hotel are locally owned. And while there’s been some consolidation as original business owners retire, the overwhelming majority of Anchorage’s tourism companies are owner operated, employing only a few people at most. Almost all qualify as small businesses in the eyes of the Small Business Administration. That direct connection is just the first local touch. Imparting a sense of place extends to hiring local guides, decorating spaces with local art or photography, featuring locally grown foods, or telling nuanced stories of Anchorage and Alaska.

According to a McKinley Research airport visitor study commissioned by Visit Anchorage, 24% of travelers reported visiting a museum or cultural attraction, and 22% visited a local brewery or distillery during their stay in Anchorage.

Business community aside, Anchorage has seen an infusion of local flavor recently: Anchorage artists have turned the city into a canvas with murals, more Indigenous Place Names Markers have been installed, and wayfinding incorporating Dena’ina motifs is coming to downtown.

“Nobody wants the Disneyfied version of the place they are traveling to” said Saupe. “Unless maybe they’re actually planning for Orlando or Orange County.”

Sharing Specifics

Visit Anchorage’s marketing isn’t one-size-fits-all either. Bouncing back post-COVID, they created a new publication, the Anchorage Neighborhood Guide, to better share specific parks, trails, sights, and experiences across the community and region. It’s available in the Visitor Information Centers and at many of the community events and celebrations the organization supports.

Trails content on Anchorage.net continues to expand as well, with the site currently featuring planning information on dozens of trails in all seasons, with more yet to come.

Even the vast Anchorage Convention Centers have gone deeper on local connections. Expanded interpretive displays on Dena’ina Athabascan culture, language, and traditional ways of life were unveiled in 2024. Meetings are imbued with a local touch in other ways; Visit Anchorage often helps visiting meetings coordinate speeches and performances by Alaskans. Many conventions or meetings also pick a local charity to create a day of service or charitable donation as a legacy of their time in the community.

Local Benefits

If they connect with a place, the value of such a local experience is huge. According to a study conducted by McKinley Research, out-of-state travelers spend more than $1.09 billion in Anchorage each year. The industry pays more than $346 million in direct wages. Tax collections from visitors through the city’s hotel room tax and car and RV rental taxes total more than $44 million, civic funding that maintains infrastructure, fills the general fund, and is reinvested in tourism marketing.

“Tourism’s benefits can be measured in dollars, in number of people, but I think the true measure of visitation is better told by more intangibles: It connects us – literally – by adding more air connections, and it enables us all to share our stories, and hear those from across the country and around the world,” said Saupe.

That Anchorage voice doesn’t even need to wait for arrival. The “Anchorage is” video series features local people sharing their take on the community in longform web videos, and is featured in some of Visit Anchorage’s social media campaigns.

Hometown Pros

For more than 50 years, Visit Anchorage, formerly the Anchorage Convention & Visitors Bureau, has been the local voice that guides travelers, meeting planners, and even residents, to fully embrace Anchorage at a local level. Staffed by long-time Alaskans, Visit Anchorage’s team are industry experts with deep firsthand knowledge of the place they call home.

“Lots of places can say they have destination marketing pros on staff,” said Saupe. “But to my mind, Anchorage stands apart because we have almost the entire staff who grew up here, or came up and made it their place for life.”