Tampa Bay area tourism is booming
By JOSH BOATWRIGHT
Tampa Tribune
Published: Oct 19, 2014

ST. PETERSBURG - Visitors prize Pinellas County for its white, sandy beaches, art museums and movie star dolphin.

They come to Hillsborough to enjoy a day at Busch Gardens, the zoo or the aquarium.

On both sides of Tampa Bay, tourists have been arriving in record numbers as the state moves toward the third straight year of visitor growth.

With one month left in the accounting year, Pinellas already has surpassed last year's $31 million record for the 5 percent tax collected on overnight hotel stays, posting more than $33 million in revenue through August.

Hillsborough brought in an annual record of $23.7 million, breaking a pre-recession high-water mark.

In Tampa, St. Petersburg and Clearwater, older hotels are renovating and developers are investing millions in new, upscale lodgings to meet escalating demand.

With a half-dozen new hotels and resorts slated for construction along bustling Clearwater Beach, the family owners of Shephard's Beach Resort remodeled their dated property, adding 46 rooms with upgraded amenities, more parking and a revamped restaurant.

The renovated 140-room resort reopened in February and the restaurant in July.

"We felt it was a good time because we see this beach starting to grow and other hotels are starting to now develop on the beach as well,” said Gerri Shephard, who runs the hotel with her brother, William Shephard Jr.

On the whole, the Sunshine State's No. 1 industry has bounced back from the recession with significant momentum in the past few years.

Last year, more than 94 million people visited the state's beaches, theme parks and coastal cities.

With more than 50 million in the first half of 2014, state leaders hope to close in on 100 million visitors by the year's end.

Visit Florida, the state tourism arm, is using its $74 million budget to market the state to an ever-widening variety of domestic and international markets, particularly by joining with local agencies to attract new airline service.

Copa Airlines' direct flight from Panama City to Tampa International Airport, linking the area with Latin America, was one of the fruits of this partnership, which included tourism officials from Visit St. Pete/Clearwater and Hillsborough's agency, Visit Tampa Bay.

"We've seen a significant increase in international airlift to the state of Florida,” Visit Florida President Will Seccombe said.

"It's really encouraging to see that strong partnerships are in place and that people are actively working together.”

Last week, Visit Tampa Bay Director Santiago Corrada joined Pinellas tourism officials on a marketing mission in Brazil, selling tour operators on a beach vacation combined with trips to Busch Gardens and Lowry Park Zoo.

"There are so many options, and what we're trying to do here is convince some of these agencies to consider staying several days on the West Coast of Florida and, if you want to stay in Hillsborough County, we'd love that; if you want to stay in Pinellas County, we'd love that, too,” Corrada said.

Visit St. Pete/Clearwater is investing heavily in Latin America, hiring a full-time sales director last year who travels the region constantly, with plans to increase staff to three over the next several months.

The effort has yielded nearly 128,000 visitors from the region from January to August this year, a 48 percent increase from the previous year.

While that's only a fraction of the county's biggest international market in Europe, which represents more than 690,000 travelers, an additional 42,000 visitors who tend to stay for long periods and spend lots of money has a significant economic impact.

"For the time being, the numbers aren't as impressive as the percentages, but before long, when we see a growth of 40,000 here, 20,000 there, we expect this to be a very robust and lucrative market for the destination,” said VSPC Interim Director David Downing.

Another partnership that appears to be paying off for the local tourism industry is linking the area's beaches with the theme park mecca of Orlando less than two hours away.

In Europe, especially, visitors planning two- or three-week holidays will get a pitch to divide their time between Disney World and the beach.

A major goal of VSPC's European staff has been to reduce the difference between the number of British visitors that visit Orlando and Pinellas County.

In 2007, Orlando attracted 990,000 U.K. travelers, while Pinellas drew 528,000. In 2013, the split was much closer, with 759,000 going to Orlando and 621,000 visiting Pinellas beaches.

"The message always is twin center, twin center, twin center. We don't want everyone staying in Orlando for three weeks. We want them coming to the beach and staying with us,” Venessa Alexander of VSPC's United Kingdom office said in a recent presentation to the county's Tourist Development Council.

All this visitor growth gradually is driving up the occupancy rate at area hotels and, in turn, increasing daily room rates.

That additional revenue translates into more bed tax revenue for county tourism agencies, which are using the extra money to reach more markets during seasons that are typically slower.

Pinellas County's sunny TV ads that begin appearing up north when winter hits full force will roll out around the first autumn cold snap this year, hopefully before viewers are saturated with images from a competing paradise.

"There has been a surge across seasonality. The tide is shifting all the way through the year right now and that's something we want to see continue,” Downing said.

While top northern feeder markets like New York and Chicago continue to grow, the only group of visitors that appears to be shrinking slightly is those traveling inside the state.

Walter Klages, Pinellas' research consultant, said at a recent meeting the 5 percent drop-off in the Florida market may be a side effect of the rising hotel rates.

Developers see enough tourism demand to justify a big crop of new hotels and resorts.

Upscale boutique hotels, such as Epicurean and La Meridien, that opened recently in Tampa are two examples of the investments being made around the Tampa Bay area, Corrada said.

In Clearwater Beach and downtown St. Petersburg, there are also numerous upscale hotels in some stage of planning or construction.

To Shephard, all the new competition appears to be a sign of the destination's growing tourism market rather than a threat to business.

"The more hotels on the beach the better for everybody,” she said.

jboatwright@tampatrib.com
(727) 215-1277