That’s a phase that I never heard when my family and I moved to Branson in the early 90’s. In fact it seemed that every day you would look at the paper to see what new project was being announced. Of course many of those new announcements never came to pass, but many did…in fact many of those businesses play a big part in Branson today.
Today, I hear a lot of we don’t need any more of those…..fill in the blank. It seems that a lot of businesses today would rather see less new development than more. Show producers and theater owners think that fewer shows would be better rather than more…hotel operators want fewer hotel/motels and nightly rental condos than more and attractions want fewer attractions rather than more. Show producers are driving parking lots counting cars in order to see how their competition is doing. I suppose that is ok, but it seems that instead of trying to figure how to make their show better and more marketable, they would rather cut their ticket price, give the ticket outlet a bigger commission or run their competitors show down. It seems to me that we are starting to “eat our young” instead of trying to figure out how to grow the pie bigger so everyone can be more successful.
Of course the tough economy adds to these sorts of actions and it is understandable that someone who is struggling would want less competition. It is pretty amazing however to be told that your city leaders are telling possible new business owners, brokers and developers that we don’t need their business…in fact if the city official had their way they would knock down half of what we currently have. That is amazing and perhaps makes it more clear why out of state brokers, investors and developers who talk with us and appear to be excited about a new project in Branson …lose that enthusiasm a few days after returning from their visit. Could it be they talked to city hall? The city leaders use to be the first people you would send a prospect to meet. Now, you want to make sure that they don’t talk with anyone at city hall.
We’ve even been told recently by an out of state broker working with us on one of their hotel listings, that a city leader told them that they would not approve another hotel in this city and if they had their way they would knock down half of all the hotels currently in the city. Of course that shocked this hotel broker who was trying to sell a Branson property. It also shocked them that when they congratulated the city on The Branson Landing and how well it was done, they were quickly told that it was awful and a pain in the neck. One doesn’t have to like The Landing developers, but you shouldn’t constantly bad mouth people who invested over $25M in cash and another $190M in debt building a convention/retail project that would benefit the city long into the future. Nor should you treat the developers of the Branson Airport who invested many millions of their dollars and another $135+M of other investor dollars who bought bonds in order to finance this project. I’m not sure how you can believe that if you don’t live up to an agreement that you made with these people in order to help finance the project, that it would have absolutely no negative effect on the city or its future credibility. No wonder the city had to budget over $900,000 in legal fees for this operating budget. I guess they are planning on being sued some more.
Who should decide what is needed in this community. Of course there should be planning and there should be a focus on what is missing in the economy. There should be an aggressive plan to recruit those missing ingredients and a plan to help attract those missing businesses. That is how a tax base is grown, jobs are created and the community fabric is improved. The community should support and cheer for more of those kinds of businesses. But for elected officials to decide that we don’t need something is not the cities decision to make. It is the investor, their bank and their minister’s decision to make. Someone who ran for public office doesn’t make them the smartest person in the room. Someone who decides to invest their money and their partners money in a business …doesn’t make them the smartest either…..it just gives them the right to do try their idea. At least that’s how it is suppose to work for now, although it seems that both the local and federal governments want to pick the winners and losers in our economy. That is not how to grow a local or national economy.
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