Rick Taylor, executive director of the Hattiesburg Convention Commission, has been instrumental in growing attractions in the City of Hattiesburg, Mississippi, for over three decades. His success with event venues and museums led the City of Hattiesburg to seek his help in 2010 to save the Hattiesburg Zoo, a much-loved landmark operating since 1950. The zoo was losing attendance and required over US$1 million in tax subsidies to remain open.
Through his strategic reorganisation of the Zoo, Taylor eliminated the need for city subsidies within two years. Under his leadership, the zoo has undergone a complete transformation, with the addition of more than 75 new exhibits and operational structures, including an animal hospital, quarantine facilities, a giraffe barn and exhibit, a hyena exhibit, a colobus monkey exhibit, an Australian mixed-species exhibit, a steampunk-style education discovery centre, two new restaurants, and an events pavilion.
Furthermore, Taylor’s efforts have brought a variety of new animal species to the zoo, such as giraffes, bongos, sloths, genets, hyenas, wallabies, and tapirs.
Attendance at the zoo has surged from 23,000 annual visitors in 2010 to over 200,000 in 2023. Efforts to grow zoo attendance included a greatly expanded educational outreach program to schools and the introduction of an annual series of nighttime adult-only zoo events for typically non-zoo-going adults.
“We have a substantial education and outreach program,” said Rick Taylor, speaking to blooloop in 2023. “All of our outreach within a 50-mile radius is free. We will go to any school, and bring animals. We will do a core curriculum-approved presentation. There is only one requirement: you must allow us to give every child a buy-one-get-one-free ticket. That means that they will go home and tell their siblings and their parents about the animals they’ve seen, and then they will want to come to the zoo.”
In 2024, the zoo financed and opened Serengeti Springs, a five-acre waterpark in its Africa area, to ensure the zoo’s long-term financial viability, enhance the zoo experience, and fund continued growth in exhibits, improvements, and expansion.