Space Coast Office of Tourism, Local Media Team Up to Promote Brevard Restaurants, Retail Stores

Space Coast Daily, Spectrum, iHeart Radio and Clear Channel Outdoor to help reinvigorate the Brevard County economy

“Our local hotel, restaurant/bar and store owners need the support of not only tourists coming to visit the area, but locals as well. Locals are the lifeblood of most businesses.”

– Space Coast Office of Tourism Executive Director Peter Cranis

BREVARD COUNTY, FLORIDA – The Space Coast Office of Tourism is working with local media companies including Space Coast Daily, Spectrum, iHeart Radio and Clear Channel Outdoor to help reinvigorate the economy and encourage citizens to patronize local restaurants and retail stores.

The campaign, called Relaunch Space Coast (#ReLaunchSpaceCoast), will run public service announcements on TV, radio and digital billboards from now until the end of the year.

As businesses have reopened, they are in need of all the help they can get. If we as citizens can do something to help others including keeping businesses open and employing people, that is an amazing thing.

With the pandemic shutting down restaurants, bars and many service businesses, the negative impact to small businesses has been tremendous. In April alone, Brevard lost 22,000 jobs.

Hotels were shut down to tourists during April and most of May and this really hurt them as well.

The April STR report (the hotel occupancy and revenue report) showed hotel occupancy down by over 70 percent and revenue down by 80 percent compared to April of last year.

Those hotels have now reopened and are beginning to rehire those that were laid off or furloughed. But, the work is far from done.

Only with the help of locals will restaurants, shops, and hotels be able to return to their previous levels of business.

Our local hotel, restaurant/bar and store owners need the support of not only tourists coming to visit the area, but locals as well. Locals are the lifeblood of most businesses.

When tourism is low or out of season, it is the locals that keep coming back to restaurants and stores.

And as many businesses have been shut down or changed their business model the last several months, it is more important than ever for all of us to do whatever we can to get them back open – and keep them open!

Tourism is a $2.5 billion business in Brevard. But, it is not just about tourist dollars. Locals account for nearly three-quarters of the sales tax paid in this county.

And without locals, there would be no revenue for the Indian River Lagoon restoration (the ½ penny self-imposed tax). And what about jobs.

Brevard employs nearly 30,000 people in the tourism industry, representing nearly $750 million in wages and earnings. Where do these people go if their employer doesn’t reopen, or only opens with half the staff?

Well, on unemployment if they’re lucky and possibly seeking assistance from the many non-profit organizations like food banks, etc.

This drains the resources of those organizations that have been helping with the most fragile of society. It is much better to get people back to work by generating revenue for employers who will then rehire staff as they see more volume.

While Brevard has been hit hard economically by the pandemic, we are resilient and will come back. We’ve come back from so many hardships in the past.

But with the same spirit that people who had the ingenuity to put a man on the moon and have now relaunched humans from the Space Coast back to space again have, we can get Brevard working again and benefit all of us who love to live, work and play here!

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