The coronavirus has not been kind to Florida tourism

The coronavirus has not been kind to Florida tourism.

VISIT FLORIDA this week released a report on visitor estimates and travel industry trends, and the numbers weren't good.

Second quarter estimates suggest that 12.8 million total visitors traveled to Florida from April to June – over 98 percent of them were domestic visitors as international travel was mostly shut down.

That is a 60.5% drop compared to the second quarter of 2019.

There were only 235 thousand international visitors in the second quarter and only 8000 Canadians.

In terms of Canadian visitors that a drop of 99.1 percent from the year before.

Franklin County has not been hit quite as hard as other counties.

Franklin saw a 25 percent drop in tourist tax collections in May compared to the year before.

TDC Executive director John Solomon told the county commission this month that Franklin County’s vacation rental outlook is actually trending better than much of Florida in terms of paid occupancy.

From January through December, Franklin County's occupancy numbers and future paid occupancy numbers are trending 25% higher than Northwest Florida and Florida as a whole.

Solomon attributes the positive trend to the area’s rural characteristics and targeted messaging. Pointing out that we are a nature-based tourism destination conducive to social distancing and the marketing team has been diligent in crafting a message of visiting safely and responsibly during this COVID pandemic.

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