2025 Leadership Award
The Branson Christmas Coalition has named AIRO–Branson Helicopter Tours the recipient of the 2025 Branson Christmas Coalition Leadership Award, recognizing the company’s investment, vision and commitment to making Ozark Mountain Christmas bigger, brighter and more memorable for area visitors.
The award was presented to AIRO owners Camron and Lee McAhren on August 18 during Good Morning, Branson, a community networking and breakfast program hosted by the Branson Chamber and Convention & Visitors Bureau.
AIRO–Branson Helicopter Tours was selected unanimously by the Branson Christmas Coalition Board for its efforts to enhance Branson’s Christmas experience and its willingness to invest in projects that benefit the destination as a whole.
“AIRO–Branson Helicopter Tours represents exactly the kind of leadership that continues to move Ozark Mountain Christmas forward,” said Elizabeth Hughes, Branson Christmas Coalition Executive Director. “They saw an opportunity to make the Christmas experience better, understood how that investment could benefit the entire destination, and took action. That willingness to raise the bar is what this award is all about.”
AIRO embraced the Coalition’s vision in 2024, investing its own creativity and resources to make the attraction shine during Ozark Mountain Christmas. The company expanded that commitment in 2025 by investing in a programmable RGB lighting system designed to enhance the Community Christmas Tree and synchronize its lighting with the iconic Branson Ferris Wheel’s Christmas Electrify show.
The investment continues a long tradition of Branson businesses working together to build Christmas into one of the community’s defining tourism seasons.
Branson’s Christmas story stretches back generations, including the creation of the illuminated Nativity scene overlooking Lake Taneycomo by Steve Miller and Joe Todd in 1949, a community tradition that eventually grew to include the Adoration Parade. In 1988, community leaders launched Ozark Mountain Christmas as a way to extend Branson’s tourism season, with businesses decorating, theaters embracing Christmas productions and Silver Dollar City launching An Old Time Christmas.
Today, nearly 21% of Branson’s annual visitation occurs during November and December, compared with 18% for its competitive set, making Christmas one of the destination’s clearest competitive strengths. With overall visitation remaining below 2019 levels and summer visitation down nearly 10%, strengthening the November and December season continues to be an important priority for the Branson/Lakes Area.
The Branson Christmas Coalition was established in 2015 by Peter Herschend and a group of area business leaders with the goal of increasing November and December visitation by making the community’s Christmas experience bigger, better, brighter and more memorable.
Research into the impact of the Coalition’s efforts has shown that 47% of November and December visitors say “America’s Christmas Tree City” is very or extremely important in their decision to visit Branson, while 11% indicated they would not have visited without that appeal. The initiative has been estimated to generate more than $20 million in incremental visitor spending annually.
That success is supported by investments from businesses throughout the community, including Chick-fil-A, Ripley’s Believe It or Not!, Lodge of the Ozarks, Dolly Parton’s Stampede, The Track Family Fun Parks and many others that have created Christmas experiences designed to encourage visitors to stop, take photos, make memories and return.
“If Branson is going to become the destination Americans call home for Christmas, want to share with others and return to year after year, it will happen because businesses and community leaders continue to raise the bar—not just for themselves, but for the entire destination,” said Hughes.
For its vision, investment and action, the Branson Christmas Coalition Board unanimously selected AIRO–Branson Helicopter Tours for the 2025 Leadership Award.
For more information on the Branson Christmas Coalition go to www.BransonChristmas.org or contact Elizabeth Hughes.
To make plans for a visit to Branson for the Ozark Mountain Christmas season, go to www.ExploreBranson.com