A St. Johns County tourism leader says the area has a secret weapon to buttress an already improving economy.
Richard Goldman, executive director of the St. Augustine, Ponte Vedra & the Beaches Visitors and Convention Bureau, said Sunday a significant number of vacation properties in the county are not among an independent research group’s data showing hotel occupancy rising in 2010.
“It’s my belief that our vacation rental business is also up — maybe more than our hotels,” Goldman said.
Goldman thinks that brightens already positive data from Smith Travel Research, a company that aggregates individual hotel sales data and reports them back to St. Johns County.
To date, the firm reported a year-to-year increase of nearly 5 percent in St. Johns County hotel occupancy and 7.4 percent in rooms sold, Goldman said.
He said a significant number of county vacation properties are not factored in the research group’s data, and anecdotal evidence tells him rental business is up.
October was the eighth straight month of hotel occupancy increase in St. Johns County, he said.
Bed tax revenue is up this year and would still have been “significantly” higher without the one-cent bed tax increase implemented last spring, Goldman said.
“Enough people came here and stayed here that we improved greatly without that as a factor,” Goldman said of the increase.
Reporting of bed tax revenue data lags actual occupancy by about a month and a half, so there will be no news until the new year on how many tourists stayed where. Goldman said other travel data is released in mid-December.
Goldman said St. Johns County, Miami and Orlando bucked the trend of slight tourism decline this year in Florida, but with different catalysts. Goldman attributed growth in the two signature Florida cities to luring international business.
“We are not strong in drawing that business,” he said of St. Johns County. “But we are working on it.”
This year, Goldman said St. Johns County geared spring and summer events toward families and are targeting adult couples this winter.
Throughout the area economy, business owners said anecdotal evidence supports an uneven but active recovery.
Mike Mosley, who operates area tree-removal service Van’s Yard & Tree Service Inc., said starting this fall, home owners were again more willing to outsource their yard care. But, he said, recovery throughout his customer base is rationed.
“Ponte Vedra is consistent,” Mosley said. “In other areas, people are bargaining, and in some places they just say, ‘We wish we had the money,’” Mosley said.
Tony Lippi, who owns The Panama Hat Company on St. George Street, said the usually soft merchant months of September and October improved this year, likely as tourists avoided the Gulf Coast and visited the Oldest City during the BP oil disaster aftermath.
In June, The Record quoted area tourism leaders saying the oil disaster off the Gulf of Mexico seemed to be diverting some tourists to St. Augustine, boosting local business.
Sales have dipped at his store since the Fall spike, Lippi said. But his numbers are better than forecasted and he is hopeful for a profitable holiday season.
“The good news is tourism data is solid,” he said. “We see a lot of people walking around with shopping bags, especially on St. George Street.”
Goldman said numbers lead him to be positive about the local holiday economic season.
“Things are moving in the right direction,” Goldman said. “I think the trend of more visitors coming to St. Johns County will help make this a great season.”
Glenn Hastings, executive director of the county’s Tourism Development Council, which oversees the county’s bed tax, said the overall bed tax collection for the 2010 fiscal year that ended Sept. 30 was up by $988,000. He attributed that, in part, to the fourth cent increase in the bed tax, the visitor influx diverted here from the Gulf Coast after the BP oil spill, and the return of group sales business.
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Occupancy rates for paid lodging, January through October 2010
January, down 7.6 percent
February, down 6.7 percent
March, up 3.1 percent
April, up 4.5 percent
May, up 0.9 percent
June, up 7 percent
July, up 10 percent
August, up 8.1 percent
September, up 19.4 percent
October, up 10.4 percent
Source: St. Johns County Tourist Development Council/Smith Travel Research
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