In 2023, international visitors spent approximately $1.4 billion in Michigan. That number could nosedive in 2025 and in the years to come, as shifts in federal foreign policy strain international relations and slow across-the-border tourism. Experts say the impact is especially likely to affect Michigan, given its proximity to Canada. But will Traverse City and its tourism-dependent economy feel the effects?

Late last month, Bridge Michigan reported that border crossings from Canada into Michigan had “declined sharply since Trump took office,” dipping “more than 10 percent from this time last year.” The drop in Canadian visitors follows calls from former Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for his citizens to stop financially supporting the United States economy.

“Now is also the time to choose Canada,” Trudeau said in a speech on February 1, in response to President Trump’s decision to impose hefty tariffs on Canadian goods. Trudeau, who was still prime minister at the time, encouraged Canadians to buy Canadian-made products and to “support our manufacturers, our workers, entrepreneurs, and artists,” but also floated the idea of halting cross-border travel. 

In Canada, calls for boycotts on all things American have escalated since. “Feeling ‘Slapped Across the Face by Trump,’ Canadians Say They’ll Skip U.S. Trips,” proclaimed a New York Times headline from February 27. That article highlighted everything from individual travelers cancelling U.S. vacations to Canadian travel agencies observing a “softening in cross-border travel bookings.” Executives for Canada’s two largest airlines even told the Times they were adjusting flight schedules to account for a slowdown in U.S. bookings.

How much of a hit will Michigan tourism take if these trends continue? According to Nick Nerbonne, media and digital director for Travel Michigan – the MEDC office that executes the Pure Michigan campaign – Canada ultimately accounts for a relatively small percentage of Michigan tourism. In 2023, the most recent year for which data is available, Michigan tallied 714,900 visitors from Canada, “with Canadian visitors spending $237.8 million in destinations and communities throughout the state.” Per Nerbonne, those numbers are based on “an independent study by Tourism Economics reflecting travel in 2023.”

To put those Canadian travel numbers in perspective, the same report concluded that, overall, “128.3 million visitors to Michigan contributed $29.3 billion in direct visitor spending in 2023, resulting in $53.2 billion in total economic impact to Michigan’s economy.”

“We don't see a ton of Canadian tourism here in Traverse City, though I don't have an easy way to quantify the total visitorship,” says Trevor Tkach, president and CEO of Traverse City Tourism (TCT). “That said, we know we do get Canadian travelers, so likely, we're going to see a softening of that, as all indicators are showing that those numbers are down.”

Because of those metrics, Tkach says TCT has “pulled back a little bit on our Canadian marketing for this next year,” though he expects parts of Michigan that are more reliant on Canadian travel – such as Detroit and the Upper Peninsula – are more likely to “stay the course” with courting those international travelers.

That difference in approach, Tkach tells The Ticker, is reflective of the U.S. travel industry as a whole right now. At a recent travel conference in Georgia, he says international tourism was the key topic, with industry leaders split on how to handle the situation.

“I’ve been in discussions with my colleagues within the state and at the national level, and we even had some international folks at this conference; we had a few Canadians there,” Tkach says. “I think the general position on international travel was that we're not going to slow down our promotion of travel to the U.S. We want to maintain our brand presence in all markets. We know there are ups and downs all the time, so to pull back wouldn't make sense nationally. Locally, I think we’ll mostly follow that lead – we’re not completely giving up [on Canada] – but we are shifting some of our promotional investments until things pick back up.”

In a written statement, Travel Michigan VP Kelly Wolgamott vowed that Michigan would “continue to extend a warm welcome to Canadian visitors.”

A broader downswing in international travel would pose a bigger challenge for Michigan's tourism economy. The Pure Michigan campaign has invested heavily in international markets in recent years, and thanks to those investments, international tourists now for almost 5 percent of direct visitor spending in the state. With multiple countries now issuing advisories or warnings about traveling to the U.S., though, Tkach says it’s difficult to predict what the impact will be for Michigan and Traverse City.

“When you think about the tapestry of travel industry needs here in Traverse City and throughout Michigan, it takes a lot of different pieces fill out the picture. You can't rely on just type of business; you have to be very diversified,” he says. “Internationals have been a part of that mix for many, many years, and we're only able to access that opportunity because of Pure Michigan’s commitment to it. That said, Traverse City had a lot of good buzz at the end of 2024 and the beginning of 2025, between the Wall Street Journal calling us a top 10 destination to visit in the world in 2025, and a really nice Samantha Brown segment on PBS. I feel like we were on a wave there, and the early indicators I'm getting are that leisure travel interest is up. So, I’m optimistic.”