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Business Clusters |
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Opportunities In The Tourism Industry. |
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Tourism is one of North Carolina’s largest industries, accounting
for $13.3 billion spent by domestic travelers in 2004. A sizable portion
of this spending is focused on the coastal resort areas in and
around the Eastern Region, as well as the Interstate highway
corridors passing through the Region. |
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The Leisure Traveler.
The Eastern Region has enjoyed a steady increase in tourism
and business-related travel in recent years, making the hospitality
industry a major economic engine throughout the Region.
Tourists have discovered the unspoiled natural beauty and relative
lack of congestion in the Region’s beach areas. |
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Three of the Region’s counties front the Atlantic Ocean:
Carteret, Onslow and Pamlico. These areas are experiencing
rapid growth in the number of tourists visiting annually as a summer
vacation destination. Through an aggressive marketing
effort, the Region’s convention and visitors bureaus and related
organizations have extended the traditional summer season well
into the spring and fall shoulder months. In other words, these
coastal communities are now benefiting from what is becoming
a year-round visitation season. |
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The Region also benefits greatly from having several historic
sites, state and federal parks, eco-tourism attractions, and many
special events venues. Historic communities such as New Bern,
Swansboro and others will benefit as the interest in heritage
tourism continues to grow. |
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The Business Traveler.
For many travelers, the Rocky Mount/Wilson area is an excellent
halfway point along I-95 between New England and Florida, a
fact that has fueled the growth of hotel and restaurant operations
along that stretch of coastal Interstate. The most recent
traffic counts indicated that approximately 30,000 – 35,000 individuals
travel this corridor daily.
Several factors drive business travel in the Eastern Region. First,
the area has developed several regional convention centers that
are emerging as popular business event venues. These include
the Craven County Convention Center (New Bern), the Crystal
Coast Convention Center (Morehead City), the Pitt County
Convention Center (Greenville) and the Gateway Convention
Center (Rocky Mount). All of these combine to provide opportunities for trade shows, training conferences, etc. that are attracting more and more business travelers annually.
The high concentration of military installations in the Region
brings in large numbers of representatives of defense and related
contractors on a regular basis, many of whom remain in the
Region for days and even weeks at a time. |
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Tourism Management Training.
East Carolina University offers two bachelor’s degree programs
and associated graduate level concentrations to support the
hospitality industry: |
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| Hospitality Management — There are approximately 275 undergraduates and 10 MBA students in this program, with undergraduate concentrations in Restaurant Management, Hotel Management, and Conventions and Special Events Management. The program includes a required 600-hour internship component. Special instruction for the business community is available on a
case-by-case basis. |
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| Recreational and Leisure Studies — This program, which centers around the actual activities found at recreational complexes such as parks and within commercial tourism venues, has over 200 undergraduate students and 30 graduate level students. This program also focuses on internship opportunities for students. |
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For more information about travel and attractions in North
Carolina’s Eastern Region, click on Tourism here or in the main
menu on any page. |
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Click here for Tourism Income Statistics for the Eastern Region. |
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