A North Texan’s blood is thick with our history: an independent, tenacious spirit; the love of wide-open spaces; and football. It doesn’t matter if your blood runs purple, green, blue, maroon or burnt orange. In North Texas, the fall weekends belong to football.
It should come as no surprise that the new College Football Playoff National Championship chose North Texas to be the home of the inaugural title game on Jan. 12 at AT&T Stadium. Nor that Las Colinas is home to the College Football Playoff office, which is just down the street from the offices of the Big 12, Conference USA and the National Football Foundation. In other words, North Texas is at the center of the college football huddle.
That’s great for fans of college football, but how does this benefit everyone else?
Sports tourism is a rapidly growing segment of the North Texas economy. Since 2009, North Texas has hosted the Super Bowl, the NBA All-Star Game, the NBA Finals, the NCAA men’s basketball Final Four, two World Series and, of course, the annual Cotton Bowl Classic.
Like these other world-class events, the College Football Playoff is expected to draw 100,000 domestic and international visitors to our region, which equates to full flights into D/FW Airport and Love Field, increased retail spending, hotels at capacity and the hospitality industry getting an added boost during what is traditionally a slow time of year. The Texas comptroller’s office expects this one event to have an economic impact of more than $300 million on our region’s economy.
The College Football Playoff also gives us an opportunity to showcase the brand of the Dallas-Fort Worth region. Starting today, a distinguished 13-member selection committee will fly in and meet weekly at a local hotel to vote on and then release its weekly rankings. These men and women will have repeated exposure into the hospitality, the convenience and business benefits of North Texas. And, because the College Football Playoff offices are based in North Texas, our region will have home-field advantage for years to come — even in years that we don’t host a game.
North Texas is home to a vast and diverse economy, from aviation and defense to utilities and transportation. Over the past five years, the leaders of our region have been hard at work expanding our commercial portfolio to include the business of sports, giving us added jobs, pumping millions of dollars into our economy and putting North Texas front and center during game broadcasts.
Our region has been long known as the place where business champions are crowned — from Lamar Hunt to Mark Cuban, Jerry Jones to Ross Perot. It’s now quickly becoming the place where sporting champions are crowned.
Game on.
Mabrie Jackson is the president and CEO of the nonprofit North Texas Commission. Reach her at mabrie@ntc-dfw.org.
