Sunshine Matters

We are very proud to unveil our newly revamped website for the Partnership for Florida’s Tourism.  It was designed by the same talented individual who created the Sunshine Matters blog.  Continue reading »

As VISIT FLORIDA begins planning our 2010-2011 program year, we are excited to enter the fourth year of our Insider program.  Originally referred to as “Experts,” this program consists of freelance journalists who generate content in a specialized topic area to appear on VISITFLORIDA.com.  They write articles, shoot videos, blog, answer visitor questions and participate in social media forums, such as Twitter and Facebook, to promote Florida and communicate with potential visitors. Continue reading »

VISIT FLORIDA’s Vision – to establish Florida as the #1 Travel Destination in the World – is ambitious, but even with a faltering economy, intense domestic and international competition, and reduced funding the Vision is achievable.

Together, we can establish Florida as the #1 Travel Destination in the World.  To succeed, VISIT FLORIDA must build a strategic marketing platform that aligns the collective interests of the Florida tourism industry and provides integrated marketing opportunities for the industry to leverage. Continue reading »

The ‘Share a Little Sunshine’ campaign is off to a great start!  This statewide, grassroots tourism campaign encourages all Floridians to send a personal e-mail to out-of-state friends and family inviting them to visit the Sunshine State.  The campaign was successfully launched by Governor Crist during a tourism industry rally on Miami Beach last month.  The Governor asked Floridians to get involved, saying “Together we can encourage more visitors to come to the Sunshine State. In this way, we will help keep Floridians employed, create new jobs, and help keep our state’s world-class restaurants, resorts, parks and attractions strong.”  Continue reading »

International visitors represent 11.7% of all Florida visitors.  In 2009, Florida welcomed nearly 9.5 million international visitors from 165 countries – who collectively spent over $5.8 billion in Florida.  This represents a decline of  3% in visitation and a 12% decline in spending from international visitors.  We could chalk the losses up to the global recession and presume that as the economy improves Florida will see international visitors return, but that would be a huge mistake. Continue reading »