‘This ripple effect we’re seeing’: Delaware sports tourism brings in $5 million a week

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Youth lacrosse teams from across America routinely trek to the DE Turf sports complex along a rural stretch of central Delaware.

The Chase Fieldhouse is helping transform a gritty section of southern Wilmington by drawing kids’ soccer, basketball, volleyball and lacrosse clubs from other states.

Baseball teams from all over the country have been flocking for years to the Sports at the Beach facility in Sussex County.

Sports tournaments have gained a firm foothold in Delaware, and a new state study shows that the games have a serious economic impact.

The analysis, recently released by the Delaware Tourism Office, concluded that in 2023, visitor spending and tourney operations generated $258 million in spending statewide. That’s about $5 million a week.

In addition, the study found that the sports tournament business brought in another $150 million in indirect spending. That includes restaurants buying extra food and other supplies and equipment to gear up to serve big crowds of parents and kids, and spending by employees in entertainment and retail industries that sports tourism helps finance.

State and local governments in Delaware also benefited to the tune of $20.2 million in local taxes, with the games directly responsible for nearly 2,300 jobs in the hotel, food and beverage, and other industries.

Gov. John Carney, a former standout high school and college athlete who will become mayor of Wilmington in January, raved about the impact of sports tourism.

Carney, who competed in football, basketball, track and field and lacrosse in his younger days, called Delaware sports tourism “a major factor in our overall economy and a significant contributor to our state and local revenue. Travelers attending sports tournaments, races and other events, whether as participants or spectators, help to create thousands of jobs, support our small businesses and generate economic development throughout Delaware.”

Jessica Welch, the state’s tourism director, said Delaware has awarded millions of dollars in grants to facilities to improve fields, courts, seating and other amenities, and to tournament operators to attract more events so Delaware can keep grabbing a bigger share of the $128 billion annual global sports industry.

Welch said the boon in Delaware began in earnest during the coronavirus pandemic, when Carney lifted restrictions to allow for sports tournaments.

“Sports tourism was really COVID-proof, for lack of a better word, because people could still be outside, and we could still hold those tournaments and have people coming,’’ Welch said. “So that kind of set the bar for us, and really showed event operators and other states and athletes and their families and coaches that Delaware was ready to take on big tournaments and host them and could do it safely. So within that period of like four years, it’s really blown up.”