These are the salad days for the Florida hospitality industry...

Wouldn't you love to own your own B&B in a small south Florida coastal city? One right by a golf course and the Intracoastal? A breezy walk to the beach? You'd run at 98% occupancy and live life in regal splendor!

Average daily room rates in Palm Beach County are up 8.4% from the same quarter last year!

An important benchmark for hoteliers is revenue per available room, which gives an average of what visitors pay based on actual occupancy. In the second quarter, it was up by 8 percent in Palm Beach County, tourism officials said.

We can wish. We can dream.

Visit Florida the state’s tourism marketing arm, estimates that the record number includes 2.8 million visitors from overseas and 1 million Canadians.
Scott [Governor Rick Scott] has pushed to increase spending on Visit Florida advertising to try to boost the state’s tourism industry. This fiscal year the state set aside $74 million for the effort.
Last year nearly 95 million people visited the state. Scott aims to boost that number to 100 million even though legislators did not increase funding for Visit Florida as much as he wanted.

Click here for the Palm Beach Post article.