Illinois tourism advocacy

In 2017, Illinois welcomed nearly 114 million visitors, creating 18,600 new jobs for Illinois residents since 2015 and generating over $2.95 billion in state and local tax revenue, an increase of $75 million from 2016.

The Illinois Governor’s Conference on Travel & Tourism is a consortium of tourism advocates. The conference provides top-quality, tourism-focused content and indispensable industry networking to more than 400 tourism professionals from Illinois and surrounding states. Important organizations leading tourism and advocacy at the national, state and regional levels include:

Brand USA

The mission of Brand USA is to encourage increased international visitation to the United States and to grow America’s share of the global travel market. In doing so, we aim to bring millions of new international visitors who spend billions of dollars to the United States, creating tens of thousands of new American jobs.

Illinois Office of Tourism

The mission of the Illinois Office of Tourism is to manage travel industry efforts that result in sustainable and significant economic and quality-of-life benefits for Illinois residents. Moreover, it aims to promote and support the wide variety of high quality destinations and events to attract visitors, both domestic and international, to Illinois.

Illinois Council of Convention and Visitors Bureaus (ICCVB)

The mission of the Illinois Council of Convention and Visitors Bureaus is to enable members to be more effective and efficient in attracting visitors to their communities. The council provides educational opportunities in order to raise the level of professionalism in the travel industry, and it provides a forum for networking and cooperative action between the members.

Choose Chicago

The mission of Choose Chicago is to bring regional, national and international business and leisure visitors to Chicago for the economic benefit of the City, the community and our membership.

We thank these organizations, and all tourism professionals that attend the Illinois Governor’s Conference on Travel and Tourism, for their tireless support of this important industry.