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With a month to go, FY16 bed taxes beat FY15

September 14, 2016 by PR@VisitTampaBay.com

With a month to go, FY16 bed taxes beat FY15

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TAMPA (Sept. 14, 2016) – With a month left in its budget year, Visit Tampa Bay has officially surpassed Fiscal Year 2015’s record bed-tax collections for Hillsborough County.

The August total for the county’s Tourism Development Collections (aka the bed tax) reached $2.24 million, up 13.4 percent from the same period in 2015. The August report reflects hotel and short-term accommodations sold in July. The bed tax is a 5 percent levy on those stays.

August’s figure brings the total for the first 11 months of Fiscal Year 2016 to $27.6 million, about $740,000 more than the entire collection for FY2015. The fiscal year ends September 30. 

August’s report covers a period when Hillsborough County’s hotel occupancy averaged 72.3 percent and hotel revenues and profitability rose by 8.5 percent over July 2015, according to analysis by industry expert STR Inc., formerly Smith Travel Research.

The boost in July room nights was due in part to:

  • Visit Tampa Bay’s “Florida’s Most” summer marketing campaign, which focused on in-state travelers.
  • Individual campaigns with digital marketing company Adara and online travel agency Expedia.
  • Shriner’s International Imperial Session which alone filled 16,400 room nights and generated $5.1 million in economic impact

July proved to be a stellar month for leisure, transient and convention sales, said Santiago Corrada, President & CEO of Visit Tampa Bay. 

“The strength of the August report puts us that much closer to our goal of reaching $30 million in bed taxes for the year – and breaking into the ranks of the state’s High Impact Tourism counties,” Corrada said. “Tampa Bay’s continuing growth as a global tourism location is a testament to the hard work of our team and the dedication of our hundreds of partners across the destination.”