The Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce Board met this morning. At the end of the agenda, board members, business owners, share the state of their businesses. They had, mostly, encouraging things to share this morning.
“Everyone is very pleased with the summer,” Chamber CEO Wendy Northcross said. “It was better than last year. They weather was a big factor.”
The rate of hotel room occupancy rose as compared to last year and people paid more for their stay. More people dined out, especially at restaurants with outside seating. Visits to the National Seashore increased.
Those increases follow a trend. The Chamber tracks key visitation indicators - rooms tax, traffic at the airport and over the bridges, reservations. They all fell in 2008 and have made a steady increase since.
“The drop-off in the numbers doesn’t surprise me, but they’re coming back” Northcross said. “The country in general did very well with travel this year. You can’t outsource travel and tourism jobs.”
Northcross’s board members have noticed two new trends.
“We usually see a drop-off after the first two weeks in August; not this year,” Northcross said. “We’ve seen a lot of international travelers through the summer Japanese, British, German. We generally see them in the fall.”
Northcross also insisted the season hasn’t ended. The “shoulder season” ends in late September.
We’ll dig into the specific segments of the summer’s business success, and disappointments, over the next few days. Tomorrow: Retail