The rebirth of downtown Little Rock into a dining and entertainment destination has been a group effort. Leading the pack has been Gretchen Hall, who serves as the face of the Little Rock Convention and Visitors Bureau. A Sheridan native who graduated from Mount Saint Mary Academy in Little Rock and Lyon College in Batesville, she joined the LRCVB staff in 2001 and was promoted to president and CEO in 2011.
Under Hall’s leadership, LRCVB has helped re-energize downtown and elevate Little Rock’s national profile as a convention and meeting destination. This past summer alone, LRCVB hosted 112 meetings and conferences that brought more than 600,000 people to town with a direct economic impact of $20 million.
In 2019, Hall supported the creation of an entertainment district in the River Market that city officials believe will enhance tourism and provide an economic boon to downtown businesses, and she also led efforts to see portions of a local hotel tax dedicated to the Arkansas Arts Center and MacArthur Museum of Arkansas Military History.
But perhaps her biggest impact was the leadership she provided for the renovation of the historic Robinson Center Performance Hall, completed in 2016. LRCVB took an aging auditorium and transformed it into a state-of-the-art facility.
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