Tourists flocked to Florida over the first three months of 2024. The Tampa Bay area was no outlier.
According to Visit Florida, 40.6 million people traveled to the state from January through March — a 1.2% increase from the same period last year.
“The more visitors we have, the more money that comes into the state, the more money that then is available to the state and local governments to spend on infrastructure, education, whatever they prioritize,” said Dana Young, president of Visit Florida.
Pinellas County is raking in tax revenue as well.
According to the county tax collector's office, the county collected $14.6 million in tourism development taxes in March alone. According to Visit St. Pete-Clearwater, that's almost 8% higher than March of last year – and the most tourist tax ever collected in the area for any month in recorded history.
January and February were down slightly from last year, but overall tourist tax collection in Pinellas for the quarter beat last year's number.
Brian Lowack, president and CEO of Visit St. Pete-Clearwater, said with new nonstop flight options from Mexico, Amsterdam and Canada coming to the area, tourism numbers should keep increasing.
"Those offer increased opportunities for easy access to our destination to folks that haven't had those in the past,” Lowach said, “so I'm really bullish on this summer and 2024 in general."
Daily nonstop flights between Tampa International Airport and Mexico City International Airport through Aeromexico start July 1. Flights between TPA and Amsterdam through Delta Air Lines begin Oct. 26. Lowack said St. Pete–Clearwater International Airport will offer more nonstop options to and from Canada.
Santiago Corrada, president and CEO of Visit Tampa Bay, is also confident about continued tourism through the summer, especially with a Margaritaville at Sea cruise ship starting to dock at Port Tampa Bay in June.
“We're also expecting the biggest summer of conventions, meetings, events this year than we've ever had,” Corrada said. “I think we expect to see at least the same or a little bit better than we did last year."
Hillsborough County saw over 78% hotel occupancy in the quarter. That’s almost 4% higher than the state average and 20% higher than the national average, according to Corrada.
According to Visit Florida, an estimated 37.2 million people traveled to Florida from other states from January through March, the most ever for a single quarter. About 2.13 million overseas travelers and 1.28 million Canadian visitors also traveled to the state.
Additional information from News Service of Florida was used in this story.
