Park visitor data would be used for marketing
South Brewster County
Starting during the busy holiday rush, visitors to the region may have their mobile phones—and thus their travel plans, spending patterns and preferences—tracked by Brewster County officials who want to better understand tourism trends in the Big Bend.
Back in October, the Brewster County Commissioners Court approved a contract with Placer AI, an Israeli company selected by the county’s Tourism Council marketing committee. Officials hope it will give them a better sense of visitation trends and spending patterns in South Brewster County, helping them market the area with greater accuracy—but some residents were spooked by the idea of the county using taxpayer money to access private data.
Robert Alvarez, executive director of Visit Big Bend, explained that Placer’s software allows county officials to “geofence” specific areas within Brewster County that they’d like to better understand. “Then it does that whole Big Brother thing,” he explained. “It finds out where they’re from, what their income is, etcetera—the kind of stuff [that’s generated] when you allow apps to track you.”
The company’s website explains that Placer has been on the cutting edge of location analytics since 2018. “We’ve expanded far beyond foot traffic data to uncover new layers of insight—from local crime trends to planned developments and beyond,” they explain. “Today, our powerful solution delivers unmatched visibility into offline visitation patterns, trade areas, audience behavior, and demographics—helping businesses understand not just where people go but the forces that shape every market.”
Alvarez said that—despite the expense—he had high hopes for the return on investment. “I’ve heard from other colleagues that it’s a very good company,” he said.
Visit Big Bend started experimenting with the program during the Chili Cookoff at the beginning of November, geofencing the Tolbert and CASI cookoff sites as well as the Cottonwood store. They hope to expand the tracking area to the whole county, in hopes of figuring out how successful the organization’s marketing at the Texas State Fair was.
On Facebook, Precinct 2 Commissioner Sara Allen Colando addressed constituent concerns about the potential impacts to privacy. “I understand that the idea of being tracked by our phones everywhere is jarring, to say the least,” she wrote. “But it’s important for everyone who uses a smartphone to understand that it’s already an integral part of the technology that makes our lives so convenient.”
Colando said that she hoped the anonymized data collected by the app would be used to help get a fresh perspective on visitation trends. “You could think of it like a visitor survey that is running in the background, without the visitor having to do anything besides go about their regular business.”
At their November meeting, Alvarez updated his fellow board members and said that he hoped to get preliminary data by January, explaining that before contracting with Placer, officials had no way of getting hard data on how many people come to Brewster County. “I think we’re going to get some really good stuff out of this,” he said.
