How much of our business is local and how much tourists?

I had to use a new Visa app over the weekend that required the zip codes of the customers. So I got to see whether people were local or from farther away.

I've been thinking a good half or more of my customers were tourists. But...I was also aware that that might be an exaggeration.

So most of the customers today were local--Bend, Redmond, LaPine, Madras, Prineville. Maybe 15% were from further away. 

We usually drop about 1/3rd from summer to fall, so that 35% or so can be attributed to tourists to a large extent. I'm now guessing that we have more local customers than I thought. They seem like tourists because I don't know them; they aren't regulars in the old-fashioned way of recognizing them or even knowing their names. Bend and the surrounding area has become so much more populated.

But that's encouraging in it's own way. It means that we've made inroads to the locals and we can build on that. Downtown Bend is a happening place and we've been around long enough to get a steady stream of people in the door.

I can't tell you the number of years where that result was anything but certain. Years when people simply didn't come in the door that much. Years where I had to really depend on a relative handful of customers to keep going. Fortunately, the slower business coincided with lower expenses. 

It's so much nicer to be able to do the job right, get the stuff people want in the door, and to feel the vibrancy of the downtown and the store.