A new study shows the pandemic has only helped grow Wisconsin’s already healthy seven-point-eight-billion-dollar outdoor recreation economy.
From 2012 to 2017, it grew by 12-percent, employing 93-thousand people and creating nearly 4-billion-dollars in wages. But just this past spring, the state Department of Natural Resources had a 24-percent increase in sales of ATV trail passes, a 100-percent increase in first-time fishing licenses and an 18-percent increase in state park passes. Director Mary Monroe Brown of the Office of Outdoor Recreation says outdoor recreation is the number one marketable reason for people coming to the state.
