(FAYETTEVILLE) -- Despite his plans to officially suspend his presidential campaign next week, former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich was in North Carolina for much of this past week as part of his bid for the GOP nomination. 

Gingrich was in Fayetteville Friday and told WTVD that there were some positives during his run.

"When we could focus on big ideas, we did very well. I was the frontrunner in Gallup twice, both in December by a huge margin and then again right after South Carolina," he said. "The fact is, I ran into a wall of Mitt Romney's money. The scale of the money he could raise was so enormous."

Gingrich said he decided to continue his visits to North Carolina because of the strong support he has received from people in the state. His stops included Greensboro and Asheboro in addition to Fayetteville.