If you've ever experienced Mardi Gras in New Orleans (I just came back from a press trip you can read about here), you'll know just how much the celebration of abundance before Lent runs through the lifeblood of the city and its suburbs.
Elaborate parades and break-out dance parties fill the streets for weeks before the big day while the beads, masks and purple, green and gold colors that represent the holiday can be seen throughout the city year-round. The final week before Mardi Gras has been bringing in more than 1 million tourists every year — more than three times the city's 378,000 population.
Related: I rode in a float during Mardi Gras in New Orleans — here's what it was like
According to an economic study commission by the New Orleans Mayor's Mardi Gras Advisory Council and conducted by Tulane University Professor Toni L. Weiss, the economic impact of Mardi Gras last year was $891 million.
This makes up a significant part of the city's economy and includes both direct tourist spending on accommodations, food and entertainment as well as the indirect impact of getting the city ready to host multiple parades, galas and other celebrations.
Veronika Bondarenko
This is how Mardi Gras impacts the New Orleans economy (it's big)
The cash being brought in have also been on a significant increase year to year. When Weiss last conducted this study in 2014, she pinned the economic impact down to just under $465 million. In the post-pandemic world, that sum has now almost doubled and is a 300% increase from 2004.
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The latest economic impact calculated also represents 3.07% of New Orleans' gross domestic product. While the city also incurs multiple expenses for everything from clean-up and security to helping run the parades, the study's calculation is that the city earns $2.64 for every dollar invested into Mardi Gras celebrations.
'This economy supports tens of thousands of jobs, our cultural workers and economy'
"The celebration of Carnival in the City of New Orleans alone conservatively drives nearly $900 million of spending by individuals, krewes, and others, resulting in a robust two-and-a-half-to-one return on investment for the City of New Orleans," Rex official James Reiss III and Zulu President Elroy James, who co-chair the Mayor's Mardi Gras Advisory Council, said in a joint statement. "This economic activity in turn supports tens of thousands of jobs, our creative and cultural workers and economy, and thousands of small businesses, with those dollars turning over countless times throughout our community."
The net fiscal benefit of staging Mardi Gras adds up to just over $28 million while the state tax revenue brought in rose by more than $14 million last year.
The biggest boost in tourists occurred immediately after some of the travel restrictions started getting lifted amid the Covid-19 pandemic due to a number of people taking the Mardi Gras trip that they couldn't do in 2020 or 2021, but the popularity of the celebration is only expected to keep growing further quickly in coming years.
"The economic impact of Mardi Gras continued to grow as the local and national economy was expanding," Weiss wrote in the report. "Parades grew in number and length, and more celebrants came to New Orleans during the Mardi Gras season."
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