New Ulm named a top small town in America to visit

Tim Krohn, The Free Press, Mankato, Minn.
·2 min read
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Mar. 19—NEW ULM — Now the president and CEO of the New Ulm Chamber of Commerce, Sarah Warmka knows firsthand about the allure of New Ulm.

She and her husband came to BockFest at Schells Brewery in 2010, went to the Kaiserhoff restaurant and toured other attractions.

"Then we started a family and were living in St. Cloud and wanted to move to a smaller town and we moved to New Ulm. We really didn't know anything about it other than our visit, but we loved it," Warmka said.

The Brown County community of 14,100 recently landed on another best-of list after FamilyDestinationsGuide.com named it 90th in the top 150 small towns to visit in the country.

Overall, Minnesota did pretty well, having three communities on the list, which was based on a national survey. Walker is No. 98 and the western Twin Cities suburb of Medina is No. 107.

The upper echelon of best towns to visit is mostly populated by towns in warm and or lush settings or that are in top national tourist areas.

The top spot goes to Holualoa, Hawaii, with a population of 2,800. Others include West Yellowstone, Montana (5); Sedona, Arizona (9); Ketchikan, Alaska (10); Moab, Utah (20) and Jackson, Wyoming (21). Florida and California are also well represented.

Both Hawaii and Alaska each had two towns in the top 10.}

Called "the most German town in America," New Ulm boasts a rich history, numerous grand historic houses and buildings and is home to Schells Brewery, the second oldest family run brewery in the country. The town capitalizes on bus tours that come to the city and a number of German-themed events.

Warmka said several events draw several thousand visitors each, with Oktoberfest being the largest. The annual Bockfest and Bavarian Blast are also major draws.Schells Brewery itself draws tens of thousands of visitors each year and Flandrau State Park is consistently in the Top 10 most visited state parks in Minnesota.

"At a lot of state parks people plan to grill out and camp there, but when people come to Flandrau they ask about where to go to eat and what to do in town, so a lot of the reason they come to the park is because of the town."

Warmka said they constantly think about how to market the town. There are billboards up in Sioux Falls, Spirit Lake and the Twin Cities metro. The CVB has New Ulm bus wraps in Sioux Falls and even runs commercials in movie theaters.

"But I think a lot of what attracts people is organic. People come and see the town and talk to each other. And we're very historic, and we keep that in mind."