Queen Creek is only 34 years old, and for most of those years it was a small town surrounded by agriculture.
Fast forward to just five years ago and the town’s population has skyrocketed. One important component of economic development is tourism, and the town of Queen Creek’s efforts to attract visitors are just starting to get traction, especially through agritainment – the nexus of agriculture and entertainment.
“I would say we’re not necessarily at the beginning but we're not in the middle,” said Marnie Schubert, community services director for the town. “We're lucky because many of our agritainment locations were pretty established. But we only got our first hotel in the last couple of years and we're going to get a second. As the community evolves, so will our tourism because we're going to see new restaurants come in and we're going to see amplified shopping experiences as new people move into the community. Our population numbers continue to go up which means people are finding Queen Creek, Arizona. Tourism is the entry point for economic development because people wouldn't locate their business or expand their business to someplace they didn't know anything about, so typically they come and visit it first.”
