The Department of Revenue’s tax collections at the 2020 Sturgis Motorcycle Rally are currently at $1,343,348.
The revenue sum from temporary vendors in the Black Hills is a 6 percent increase compared to 2019. The state sales tax accounted for the majority of the collections with $785,251. At this time last year, the department collected $733,312 in state sales tax. The department’s 2020 collections also include $247,996 in the state tourism tax and $310,102 in municipal taxes.
“The Department of Revenue’s Business Tax Division looked for new ways to use technology that would make it easier for vendors,” Revenue Supervisor Lori Haupt said. “For the first time this year, we added the ability to email a license card to a vendor and offer electronic filing and paying of sales tax for the Sturgis Rally through our online EPath system. In return, emailing licenses allowed us to extend pre-registration longer as there was no need for mailing time. By receiving their license cards online as well as filing and paying electronically, vendors didn’t have to stand in line or leave their booth. Early numbers showed that approximately 50% of vendors chose to file and pay electronically for the first payment day,” Haupt explained.
The 2020 Sturgis Motorcycle Rally featured a decrease in temporary vendors compared to 2019. The 2020 rally featured 784 temporary vendors, while the 2019 event had 1,006.
The Northern Black Hills, which includes Sturgis and all other communities in Meade and Lawrence counties, accumulated $985,754 in tax from the 637 vendors present. The Southern Black Hills, which includes Rapid City, Custer, Hill City, and Keystone, had 147 temporary vendors with $357,594 in total tax collected.
Taxes collected at the 2020 Sturgis Motorcycle Rally included state sales, tourism, municipal sales, and municipal gross receipts.