2025: Another Great Year
Time flies but let's take a moment to slow down and reflect on another GREAT year with our members, community, and visitors!
Chamber Membership and Stats!
We are ending the year with ~1,000 Chamber Members, and we are thankful for each of you!
Total New Chamber Members - 158
Chamber Facebook – 9,900 followers
Chamber Instagram- 2,477 followers
Our weekly Chamber newsletter is opened by over 800 members each week. Click here to view past newsletters.
We were named the Rural Community of the Year by the Georgia Chamber!!
Visitor Center and Tourism Stats!
Visit Blue Ridge Socials, Newsletter, and Web:
Facebook reached 6 million users with a 15% increase and generated 330,000 link clicks with an 8% increase (plus over 22,000 new followers!).
Instagram had 1,900,000 views and 5,800 new followers.
TikTok has had 1.2 million views with 24,000 followers (an increase in 1,000 followers).
Tourism Newsletter is opened by over 40,000 people each month. Sign up here if you'd like to receive.
McCaysville & The Copper Basin Socials:
Facebook has had over 1 million views, 800 link clicks, and 1,700 new followers.
Instagram followers increased by 254 to 2,570.
Website: BlueRidgeMountains.com had 3,600,000 views, 2,000,000 sessions, and almost 1,000,000 partner referrals! The top pages viewed were Where to Stay, Things To Do, Cabin Rentals, and Events. Our content generated more than 71.5 million Google search impressions, meaning it appeared in search results that many times.
Visitation:
Fannin County
Out of Market Visitors – 2.8 million (do not live or work in County)
Average Days Visited – 4 (separately or consecutively)
Busiest day of year – July 5th, 80.8k out of market/county visitors
Downtown Blue Ridge
Out of Market Visitors – 1.2 million (do not live or work in County)
3 busiest days – Light Up Blue Ridge, Fall Arts, Blues & BBQ
*Source - Placer
Visitor Center Stats
We had excellent visitation to each of our three visitor centers. Don't forget that we have wonderful meeting spaces at both our main and Downtown Blue Ridge locations. Learn more about all our centers here.
Total guests:
Downtown Blue Ridge – 7,600+
Main Center – 4,000+
McCaysville – 6,100+
We had visitors from all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and 2 U.S. territories: Puerto Rico and Guam!! We had guests from 26 Countries: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Czech Republic, England, France, Germany, Holland, Honduras, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Netherlands, Panama, Peru, Quatar, Russia, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela.
#LovingLocal and Conservation
We remain committed to #LovingLocal as we encourage visitors to enjoy Blue Ridge and Fannin County responsibly, helping to preserve our beautiful natural resources.
Our Commitment to Conservation (C2C) Program rolled out on Earth Day 2025 and will continue into 2026. Learn about our Conservation efforts and the C2C program here.
Take note of upcoming dates related to Conservation:
January: C2C applications open through March 31st
April 22: Milkweed + Firefly Workshop
May 8th: Free Milkweed Day
July 2nd: Fannin County Firefly Day [Stay tuned to see how you can participate!]
Fannin County Hotel/Motel Excise Tax
From January to October 2025, County lodging (hotel/motel) tax has remained steady compared to last year with a 1% increase in collections. Additionally, SPLOST collections to date are 2% over last year at this same time.
Why is this significant?
While many communities have seen visitation return to pre-COVID levels, our economy continues to thrive. This sustained visitation supports local businesses and drives growth.
A portion of the tax is dedicated to Tourism Product Development (TPD) projects. These capital projects benefit our entire community—residents, visitors, and children of all ages.
Click here for the full list of projects!
Have questions about hotel/motel tax?
Understanding the restrictions and percentage breakdowns can be complex. If
you’d like more information, please email president@blueridgemountains.com or
call 706-632-5680 to speak with Christie Gribble.
Upcoming in 2026
Business After Hours will kick off on Tuesday, January 13th, at The Blue Ridge Community Theater. New this year, we are offering two Breakfast Before Business networking events in place of Business After Hours. Our full schedule can be found on our Chamber Event Calendar here.
The Annual Banquet is scheduled for Saturday, March 21st.
The Clay Shoot will be on Friday, April 17th.
The Golf Tournament will be on Tuesday, October 20th.
To stay up-to-date with Chamber events, view our Chamber Events Calendar.