DistiNCtly Fayetteville announces the first ever Fayetteville Tourism Awards and Annual Tourism Summit

By Staff Report, posted Apr 17, 2025 on BizFayetteville.com

DistiNCtly Fayetteville is calling all hospitality businesses throughout Cumberland County’s vast tourism industry to submit their nominations for the 2025 DistiNCtly Fayetteville Tourism Awards coming to the community on Sept. 18, 2025.

This is the first event of its type for the organization, focused on recognizing the outstanding work, leadership and hospitality provided by the community in Cumberland County.

“We want to recognize individuals in our community who have really had an impact on tourism. Maybe it's you, maybe it's a team member on your team, maybe it's somebody that you have collaborated with in the community, and you think it's darn time we recognize them,” shared DistiNCtly Fayetteville President & CEO Devin Heath.

THE AWARDS ARE BROKEN INTO FOUR CATEGORIES:

Tourism Visionary Award

Honors an outstanding individual or organization in the local hospitality industry who displays foresight and exceptional leadership skills to impact the Cumberland County hospitality and tourism industry and the community.

Partner of the Year Award

Honors a partner in the local hospitality and tourism industry who recognizes the value of working together to achieve greatness.

Event of the Year Award

This category recognizes a first time or recurring event that had significant community support and partnership, which attracted visitors to Cumberland County, can demonstrate visitor spending and/or overnight rooms and was effectively promoted to out-of-county visitors.

Can Do Hospitality Awards

Honors and celebrates multiple employees and volunteers in the tourism/hospitality industry who enhance visitors’ experiences in Cumberland County.

Each of the awards will recognize one winner except for the Can Do Hospitality Awards, which will be given to multiple winners.

“That’s geared towards the folks who really make tourism work here, the frontline teams,” said Heath. “As we all know, it takes an army to make our operations successful, and we (business owners, management, etc.) oftentimes are the ones that get the credit and get the accolades. But we know that there are frontline associates at each of our operations that really make us successful. This is an opportunity to recognize those individuals.”

The awards will be presented at DistiNCtly Fayetteville’s Awards Luncheon immediately following the Annual Tourism Summit, also taking place on Sept. 18.

The Summit is the first event of its kind to be organized by the current DistiNCtly Fayetteville team and will be open to the public.

While plans for the Summit are still in early development, Heath shared that it will be an informative event for the area’s hospitality industry.

“The purpose of the summit is really to collaborate with our community, our community partners [and] elected officials, talk about the state of the industry of tourism, where we've been this past year, and where we're headed in this future year,” said Heath. “We’re going to really talk a lot about the outlook for the future, both from an industry perspective, as well as what exactly DistiNCtly Fayetteville is going to be doing going forward.”

Heath shared that the Summit will be presentation based with a focus on education and networking to build opportunities within the community.

“We're not going to have traditional booths and things like that, it's going to be presentations. The DistiNCtly Fayetteville team will provide a presentation, we have invited a couple of industry powerhouses to come and speak. They are leaders in the tourism industry not just in the state, but in the country,” shared Heath. “But I think the real power and the knowledge gained will come from each other coming up and talking.”

More announcements about the Summit are expected in the coming weeks, but DistiNCtly Fayetteville is accepting nominations for the 2025 DistiNCtly Fayetteville Tourism Awards until May 23, 2025.

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