Is the BP Oil Spill Wrecking Florida Tourism?

May 13, 2010 at 1:40 PM | by Omri | Comments (0)

As happened during the Big Ash disaster a few weeks ago, we were of two minds when we heard Florida's Gov. Crist describe how the BP oil spill had utterly devastated tourism in the Panhandle.

Tourists, laboring under the mistaken assumption that the spill had reached the state's beaches when it was actually far away, were canceling their vacations. Panhandle occupancy rates, according to Florida officials, were down to "less than 20 percent." The very existence of Florida tourism would "live and die by the next 90 days." All of this came as Crist was demanding a cool $35 million from BP, which would allow the state's tourism board to run ads explaining that their beaches are pristine. It's a great deal if you can get it, basically saying "you need to pay us $35 million because your spill has not reached our shores."

On one hand, sure there's the possible consequence of cancelled vacations and less tourism revenue, that people in Florida tourism would lose their jobs. On the other hand, 20% occupancy means great travel deals. If hotels were literally going out of business over the next 90 days on account of being deserted, the panicked price cuts and bundled resort packages were going to be simply decadent. Except that Florida's tourism is not in danger because of the oil spill, so forget it.

What's actually true is that most Panama City resorts are sold out every weekend through the end of May, and that the vast majority of 3 and 2 star hotels aren't even giving discounts. We're not saying that Gov. Crist is trying to win a little free cash for his tourism board by kicking BP while they're down, but we are saying that we've embedded a gallery of Orbitz searches for every weekend this month and that there's a decided lack of not sold out resorts. Bummer. Maybe all those places just got really lucky.

[Photo: Brian Everett / EVRT Studio / Flickr]

Related Stories:
· Fla. Gov Asks BP To Pay For Oil-spill Tourism Ads [TheStreet]
· Tourism Boards [Jaunted]
· Florida Travel [Jaunted]

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