Route 66 tourism, centennial kickoff prompt economic ripple

With Route 66 reaching the century mark, centennial celebration organizers are kicking into high gear getting ready for the highway’s anniversary date of April 30 – prompting focus on the ways the Mother Road creates economic activity and spillover effects.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City has published a new report examining how small towns have successfully used route-based tourism as a valuable strategy for economic development.

“The major theme and biggest surprise from this research is that longtime residents of small towns often can’t see what might draw visitors,” said Jennifer Wilding, community engagement adviser at the Kansas City Fed and the report’s author. “Newer or younger residents have helped others see the town with fresh, appreciative eyes and have led the way in spurring unique approaches to economic development in many communities.”

The National Travel Center found that a byway can feasibly generate between $250,000 and $450,000 per mile per year in visitor spending when it features heritage and cultural locations, offers visitors plenty of places to visit and opportunities to spend money, includes destination-distinctive accommodations and local cuisine, and is well-promoted.

Bill Hobbs, chair of Visit Springfield, Missouri’s board and director of hotel operations for Elliott Properties Ltd., said the intention behind the Route 66 centennial celebration and the building of long-term monuments like the Queen’s Gate 66 sculpture near the Best Western Route 66 Rail Haven motel and the sculptures celebrating Route 66 and the vanished Colonial Hotel – the place where the famous telegram suggesting federal officials adopt 66 as the numeral designation for America’s Mother Road – “is to bring back attention to something like ice cream and apple pie, and nostalgia for that type of stuff.”

Cora Scott, the city of Springfield’s director of public information and civic engagement, chairs Missouri’s Route 66 Centennial Commission. She said that state tourism officials and those who own attractions along Route 66 have collaborated with the centennial commission to create a vision that will outlast the kickoff festivity itself, to help “create a culture of people who want a road trip, get to know America and enjoy what America has to offer – at least where Route 66 goes through.”

Other officials with knowledge of Mother Road visitation say the route is continuing to build momentum that will go beyond the centennial celebration this year.

Stephen Foutes, director of the Missouri Division of Tourism, said the centennial creates a “nice opportunity to increase visitation all along the route.” Moving beyond the centennial, he said success five years from now would consist of increases in domestic and international travel along the route.

“We will see businesses that are along the route continue to be there and thrive,” he said. “Continuing that spirit of travel and adventure is really, I think, one of the big keys to saying this has been a successful centennial celebration.”

Kaitlyn McConnell, who writes about companies and people along and adjacent to Route 66 as founder of Ozarks Alive, said for companies along the route, increased enthusiasm is good for business.

“Their world every day is promoting Route 66,” she said, noting that “they want to have that same level of enthusiasm” during the centennial and beyond.

McConnell said Route 66 is constantly evolving and that the centennial would be part of that shift.

“It is a living thing,” she said. “It’s just not that we’re celebrating history. It’s a constantly evolving story.”

While he said visitor trends can be difficult to predict in years beyond the centennial – studies estimate the route attracts between 2-5 million visitors a year and much higher figures expected this year – Foutes said the celebration would create increased visibility.
“It is my hope and my belief that the work that’s been done by the Route 66 Centennial Commission and hopefully by our office ... will continue to inspire both domestic and international travelers for years to come.”

Kickoff economy
Officials behind the National Route 66 Centennial Kickoff Celebration, set for April 30-May 3 in Springfield, hope to leverage the visibility and calls for Mother Road nostalgia. They have a break-even goal in mind for the fete.

Scott said the commission, convened over three years ago by the Missouri General Assembly, has a fundraising goal of roughly $1.7 million when incorporating all the multiday celebration’s components, including ticket sales, sponsorships and fees.

“Essentially, we’re just trying to make enough money to break even on the event itself,” Scott said, adding the commission has received around $3.5 million over a three-year period from the state to help lead Missouri’s planning, coordination and preservation efforts for the 100th anniversary of Route 66.

In Springfield, those efforts for the kickoff celebration include an April 30 concert with headliner Little Big Town, a parade, multiple car shows, a patriotic-themed reception and the May 2 National Telegraph Ball, a black-tie event that also serves as a fundraiser to help the commission cover event costs.

Staging the kickoff celebrations is one example of local economic activity spurred by Route 66, Scott said: “I can tell you that there are some beneficiaries that people might not think of, like for instance local trades and behind-the-scenes labor. So, we have electricians, stage hands, riggers, AV techs.”

Steve Eudaly, co-owner and general manager of Headline Productions LLC, employs those sorts of professionals. His firm is helping put on the kickoff celebration’s Telegraph Ball, providing lighting, sound and video production services for the event, which is to be held at the Shrine Mosque, 601 E. St. Louis St. He said his company began work on the project some six months ago.

“We will have 16 different crew members involved in setting up the show, operating the event and tearing it all down at the end,” Eudaly said. He said Headline Productions’ Telegraph Ball crew comprises stage hands, riggers and technicians for sound, lighting and video.

“We’re going to have multiple trucks full of sound, lighting and video equipment,” Eudaly said. “Especially for a large venue like the Shrine Mosque, we will hire stage hands that help us unload the trucks and move the gear inside the building and then help set up under the supervision of technicians.”

Sponsorship revenue
Scott said the commission has been securing sponsorships and promoting ticket sales for events like the Telegraph Ball that Headline Productions will be staging in the months leading up to the celebration. Noting a cutoff period of mid-April for sponsorships, Scott said she wasn’t ready to say how close officials are to meeting the fundraising goal or to provide a breakdown of individual costs, such as insurance, security and cleanup.

“We have projections, but not anything that’s prepared at the moment,” she said, noting the commission has funds secured at the Community Foundation of the Ozarks Inc. “When this is all said and done, I will have a full accounting for this from the Missouri commission.”

One of the higher expenses for the celebration is insurance, Scott said.

“Unfortunately, this is right during tornado season, and there’s a lot of effects to the insurance industry that have affected potential premiums for that, but we’re working through that right now,” she said. “So, I don’t know where we’ll end up. We just hope that we have more sponsors come on board.”

Securing sponsorship
It was nearly a year ago that Springfield was named the host city for the national Route 66 centennial kickoff. The city was awarded the honor after applying to the U.S. Route 66 Centennial Commission and the Road Ahead Partnership, a national nonprofit working to sustain Route 66 as an international destination.

Vital Farms Inc. (Nasdaq: VITL) is the presenting sponsor of the celebration, Scott said, while Bass Pro Shops, KY3, Ozarks First and O’Reilly Automotive Inc. (Nasdaq: ORLY) are among supporting sponsors.

“I will tell you it’s a big range,” she said, declining to disclose the financial total of sponsorships secured for the event. “We have sponsors at the $5,000 level, and then it goes all the way up into the six figures.”

Mike O’Brien, director of plant operations at Egg Central Station, Vital Farms’ egg washing and packing plant in Springfield, declined to disclose financial details of its sponsorship. But he said via email being the presenting sponsor lets Vital Farms connect with its stakeholders in a meaningful way.

“Route 66 helped shape this city, and Springfield helped shape Vital Farms, so joining in on the centennial kickoff just makes sense,” he said.

Beyond its sponsorship visibility, Vital Farms will have an interactive, roadside-inspired, pop-up attraction, O’Brien said, adding the company plans to share details closer to the event.

“At its heart, we’re honoring our roots – the people and places that have shaped both Route 66 and Vital Farms,” he said, noting the Mother Road has connected rural communities for a century, including many where farmers that provide eggs for the company call home.

Making investments
Mark Hecquet, president and CEO of Visit Springfield, Missouri, said the city’s return on investment for the celebration will be “significant.”

“Springfield has never hosted an event like this, and with this being a once-in-a-100-year opportunity, any exact estimate would be speculation,” he said via email. “As the Birthplace of Route 66 and the official host city for the national kickoff, Springfield is in a unique position to showcase its story to a national and international audience at a defining moment for Route 66.”

Springfield is often referred to as the Birthplace of Route 66 because entrepreneur John T. Woodruff and Oklahoma highway commissioner Cy Avery proposed the name in 1926 from the Colonial Hotel which once stood downtown at St. Louis Street and Jefferson Avenue.

The city also holds an annual Birthplace of Route 66 Festival in August, for which Scott serves as director. This year’s event is scheduled for Aug. 7-8.

Hecquet said local investments have been made for the Route 66 visitor experience, giving people more reasons to stop in Springfield, spend more time in town and stay overnight.

“We expect the Route 66 Centennial Kickoff Celebration to bring more visitors to Springfield, more overnight stays and more spending across the city,” he said. “Unfortunately, we cannot put an exact number on the number of visitors, hotel rooms or the total economic impact.”

One of those local investments in Route 66 is the city’s new Birthplace of Route 66 Plaza in the southwest section of Jefferson Avenue and Park Central East. Missouri State University gifted the 2,630-square-foot property to the city in December.

The Rotary Clubs and the Missouri Route 66 Commission jointly paid for the entire plaza project, according to Sculpture Walk Springfield Executive Director Bridget Bechtel. She said the cost of an on-site sculpture component with its integrated light and sound system is $125,000. Scott said the total investment for the plaza will be roughly $360,000.

The plaza is set to be dedicated April 30 and will also serve that day as the site for the “Today” show to broadcast live at 8 a.m. Al Roker and Dylan Dreyer will host the third hour of the longtime morning news program from the plaza.

Additionally, another new local Route 66 attraction, the Queen’s Gate sculptural monument, is set to be dedicated May 1. The city in February accepted $267,000 in state funds to install the nearly 20-foot-tall sculpture near the intersection of St. Louis Street and Glenstone Avenue that is meant to serve as a gateway for Route 66 visitors, according to past reporting.

Scott said the measurement of the celebration’s success may be difficult to gauge from a public relations and community engagement perspective.

“However, we do know that visitors typically spend between $1,500 to $2,000 per trip when they’re traveling Route 66,” Scott said, referencing data from an economic impact study on the Mother Road conducted by Rutgers University. “You can kind of do the math and see that just in sales tax alone, it has a nice economic ripple.”

Relying on Census tract data, the Rutgers study aimed to quantify market potential for Route 66 by estimating the yearly spending power of households located along the Route 66 corridor. In Missouri alone, homeowners and renters spent almost $1.7 billion per year on entertainment and just over $1.7 billion on food away from home, among total household expenditures of $32.1 billion, for example.

And Missouri is just one of the eight Route 66 states: Market potential across the full span of the Route 66 corridor includes over $172 billion in household expenditures each year, according to the Rutgers study.

According to a 2025 survey from AAA about Route 66 travel projections in 2026, 41% of all U.S. adults plan to visit at least a portion of Route 66 this year, with 15% more expressing interest after learning about the Mother Road’s centennial.

Both Scott and Hecquet said the impact of the celebration should pay dividends for the Queen City for years to come.

“Route 66 means a lot of different things to a lot of different people, but at its core, it’s just getting out and seeing the sites and enjoying face-to-face interaction,” Scott said. “And in today’s climate where we seem to be more divided, I think that something like this becomes a welcome respite.”

Additional reporting by Deputy Editor Gregory Holman.