Helene-battered but open for business, the Great Smoky Mountains are desperate for tourists

October was supposed to be Gianna Carson's busiest month of the year. Instead, she estimates she's lost upward of $15,000 since Hurricane Helene hit her Bryson City, North Carolina, bakery and vacation rental a week ago.

Now, in addition to the number of bakeshop transactions plummeting from 300 a day to around 50, she said she's "experiencing mass cancellations" at her guesthouse as tourists who usually flock to the area for its rich autumn colors think twice about coming.

Some local authorities have urged visitors to stay away as responders assess the casualties and repair critical infrastructure , including washed-out roads . But many small-business owners who were spared severe destruction in Swain County — nestled in the Great Smoky Mountains, where tourism brings the state more than $2 billion per year — are desperate for revenue and facing an uncomfortable dilemma: how to tell people they're open for business without being insensitive to neighbors who've lost power, homes or loved ones.

Bryson City, Swain's largest town, is about 65 miles west of Asheville, the seat of Buncombe County, where at least 70 people were killed by the storm. In recent days, residents there have been lining up for groceries, shelter and outlets for phone charging. But in Swain (population 14,000, a fraction of Buncombe's nearly 270,000), entrepreneurs like Carson see a "secondary catastrophe" brewing for the tourism-based economy.

Carson, whose two-suite property can host up to 11, was concerned not to appear "flippant about it — there are some towns beside us that have had some very catastrophic damage," she said. "But for us, the damage is going to come a little bit later, when everyone does not come."

She added, "I've got 12 people who depend on me for their paychecks, and lots of bills to pay."

I've got 12 people who depend on me for their paychecks, and lots of bills to pay.

Gianna Carson, bakery and guesthouse owner, Bryson City, N.C.

Operators say recreation in Great Smoky Mountains National Park — whose more than 13 million visitors last year nearly tripled the level at Yellowstone — surged during the pandemic. Bryson City's remote location appealed to guests looking for socially distanced activities, said Karen Proctor, executive director of the Swain County Chamber of Commerce. The county's tax revenues from accommodations "almost doubled" during the summer of 2020, before international travel picked back up, she said.

"People expanded during the Covid years. They added on to a restaurant, or they opened a second location," largely with their own money, since most federal aid went to county relief programs, Proctor said.

Now, many in the area fear an economic backslide.

The Folkestone Inn, a 10-room hotel in Bryson City, lost more than $10,000 within three days as at least 32 people canceled reservations through October, said co-owner Toni Rowe. Isaac Herrin lost most of the inventory in his boutique retail shop, Selah Collection, to flooding last week. He said his other business, a cabin rental company, is now "staring at 100 cancellations" into December.

The reality is, people can access our town fine. ... Our streets are clean now.

Isaac Herrin, Owner of Selah boutique, Bryson city, n.c.

"None of us can stay afloat just solely based on the local tourism or local patronage," said Herrin, who blames some of his misfortune on rental platforms like Airbnb and Vrbo for allowing guests to cancel reservations for refunds out of "hysteria."

Around the same time that one TikToker went viral for venting about her difficulty canceling an Airbnb in nearby Hendersonville, the company clarified that it was activating its "major disruptive events" policy for severely affected parts of the Carolinas, Florida, Georgia and Tennessee. Airbnb declined to comment, and Vrbo didn't respond to a request for comment.

"The reality is, people can access our town fine, and by the end of this week about 90% to 95% of our businesses will be reopened," Herrin predicted. "Our streets are clean now."

By Thursday, only one road closure was reported in Swain County by state transportation officials — Old River Road, from U.S. Highway 19 to West Deep Creek Road.

Old River runs alongside the Tuckasegee River, which features a one-hour sightseeing train popular among leaf peepers. The railroad on Thursday added a post to the "Helene updates" page on its website, saying, "Want to see how things are looking in Bryson City yourself?" with a link to a live webcam view of downtown, where traffic was running smoothly at an intersection late Friday.

While Swain County communities didn't suffer as extensive damage as others in the region, Herrin and others criticized the Federal Emergency Management Agency for omitting it from the list of designated disaster areas, limiting the county's access to federal funding. Partly in response, the Chamber of Commerce launched a GoFundMe page looking to raise at least $50,000 for "those who have experienced the loss of income from what should have been a great weekend in our small town as we ushered in the fall season."

It feels a little unethical, for lack of a better word, to try to attract people in here.

Nate Darnell, co-owner of Darnell farms, Bryson City, N.C.

The regional FEMA office declined to comment, and county commissioners didn't respond to requests for comment.

Nate Darnell, co-owner of Darnell Farms, is eager to get things back on track but feels conflicted about advertising business as usual.

"It feels a little unethical, for lack of a better word, to try to attract people in here to do the things that we would normally do to make a living," he said. "Because we're doing that right next to people in counties where people can't even get to a store to buy food."

While the family farm grows produce like pumpkins and strawberries, it relies on visitors, offering hayrides and selling local goods from other Swain County producers. Darnell estimates he's already lost more than $250,000 in flood damage and is unsure he'll be able to pay back the farm's $180,000 operating loan at the top of next year after missing those first crucial days of autumn. He recently canceled a bluegrass festival for this weekend that would have generated a financial cushion for next week.

In the meantime, Darnell said he's "hijacked" the farm's infrastructure to provide community-supported agriculture subscriptions, converting those CSA boxes into bread, dairy and toiletry kits for locals struggling to access essentials.

"It's got to be handled with kid gloves," he said. "We're thinking it's gonna take two weeks for us to kind of get out of the mode we're in now, which is community support mode."