May 5, 2024 • 33 mins
This episode we discuss major changes to the Florida retail market happening in April and start to uncover who opens their wallets for the sunshine gods and how it isn't who you may think. Join host Britta Eriksson.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:02):
Welcome to the Show Me Sun Money
a podcastabout how money is made in Florida retail.
I'm your host Britta Eriksson.
So have you been on I-75 latelyor any interstate in Florida?
Doesn't it feel so good.
You can just feel the traffic levels
sort of simmer downand the tension has just gone away.
(00:24):
It's fantastic right now,
the weather is beautifulAnd of course, it's April, right?
We're all feeling really goodabout being a local and being a Floridian,
but we start to think the traffic islower, we're going into summer.
And with that, that means retail salesare on their decline to our lowest
volume months.
(00:45):
We've reached our seasonal highin almost every market.
And we are going to start shifting downto much lower sales volumes,
where it gets really hardfor a lot of people to make it
and keep their doorsopen in August and September.
This happens for all kinds of retail,whether it be a store, a retail shop,
a restaurant, a gym, a salon,an entertainment business,
(01:07):
anything that would operatein a shopping center doesn't survive
just on the locals here.
The people like you and me who live here.
It survives on a multitude of differentfactors,
many factors that many, many peoplemisunderstand and underestimate.
They plan their inventories wrong,they plan their real estate wrong,
(01:28):
and they miss out on who the true
consumer is,who is spending the money at their stores.
So that's what we're here to talk about.
This episode is calledThe Myth of the Florida Man.
And we're talking about the importanceof the local community
versus other factors that exist in Floridaand how they influence Florida retail.
(01:50):
So what
type of influence are we talking aboutwhen we start to have this conversation?
People think that it is limited to Disney
or the beachesand it's this couple percent.
And that's not what we see when we look atthe data, when we have really good data.
And when I've looked at customerlevel data, we see that those influences
of out of area sales are huge.
(02:12):
And even the most suburban marketsin Florida markets you wouldn't
assumehave large outside of area influences.
And we look at those salesand we're seeing on the low end,
I've seen about 20%.
I've seen on the higher end over 50%,I've even seen
70% out of area sales.
And obviously for different users,this is going to affect them differently.
(02:35):
And other people may havea different response to this.
And in different marketsit may be different.
So I want to have this conversation.
I'm not coming to you as an expert.
I'm not coming to give you adviceon how to operate your business.
But I believe it's a topic that we deserveto give a little bit more attention.
I have this conversationvery often with different clients
(02:56):
when we're looking at location decisions,when we're looking at the markets
and analyzing who the consumer is
and how they can do better in the market,where they can locate to do better.
You know, we look at this and we have thesame conversation and it's very similar,
whether it be a local mom and pop shopwho's relocating to Florida
and opening their business here,maybe from New York or Chicago, Ohio,
(03:18):
even Georgia,or whether it's a national retailer
and they're looking to open storesin the state,
I find that they try to use this equationthat they've had success with
these are very smart business operatorsand they've operated in other parts of
the country where they found the successand they apply the same equation here.
But they're so confusedwhy their results are different
(03:40):
and they don't understandthe magnitude of these other factors
that exist in Floridaand why it matters to look at them.
So it's no secret that we havethe most visited theme
park in the entire worldlocated in Florida.
And of course, with that theme parkwith three additional sister theme parks,
with them having two additional waterparks, with there being a lot more theme
(04:03):
parks, a lot of people come to Floridaand do go to theme parks.
It is a main driver of tourismand a lot of tourism
dollars are spent in the communitiesaround those theme parks.
So what kind of numbersare we talking about related
just to theme parks to those areas?
(04:24):
According to themeentertainment association,
we have 77 million visitors
at Florida theme parks out of the top
11 theme parks in North America.
We have eight of them located in Florida.
The other three are located in California.
And that makes sense, right?We both have really good weather.
(04:45):
We can operate year roundand we get more sales, more dollars,
more visits at our theme parksbecause their weather allows for it.
We have the top fourwater parks in the entire country,
but tourism in Florida is
much more than just theme parksor beaches.
The sheer mass of tourism spreads out
(05:08):
and filters outside these areasbecause there's so much of it
and it filters to local communitiesthroughout the state
because the main driver of tourismin Florida is our weather
and the sunshine.
I should take a moment.
I want you to reframe your thoughtsand what you know
(05:29):
about tourismand what you think you know about tourism
and think about how your friendsand family visit you.
If you are a Floridian,if you are living here,
especially if you are from somewhere upnorth, that is cold.
Your friends and family want to come here.
They now have an end to come here, right?
(05:49):
They know you.
You live hereand you probably have people who come down
and either stay with you or stay near you.
And you probably don't live in the beachcommunity or in the theme park community.
So I'll tell you a little storyabout when we first moved down here.
I was a kid.
We are from Chicago, and pretty much
(06:10):
everyone else we knowstill lives in Chicago at that point.
They still lived in the coldand the snow and the gray and the drear.
And my parents were just done with it.
They were done with raising
small kids there and they wantedthey wanted to move to Florida.
So once we moved here, they were very,
very proud that we moved to Florida.
(06:31):
And of course, on our first Christmascard,
my parents, you know, really show offthat we live in Florida.
So me and my brother in the pooljust every day and my parents take this
really cute picture, I still have it of meand my brother swimming in the pool
during December,when it's snowing up north.
And of course, they do the *** moveand they send that to
(06:53):
all their friendswho are in Chicago and market saying
how great it ishere and *** it is where you live.
So then all of them get this cardand they get this letter.
That we swim in the pool on Christmas Daywithout a heater.
Your kids are in parkas,you're in snow suits
that you can't even put your armsand you have to shovel snow.
(07:13):
You can't even drive down the roadfor work.
You know what, our kidsdon't even have to wear clothes.
They're just out like half naked,
running around the backyardin bathing suits just all the time.
We don't need clothes down here.
It's that warm. It's that much better.
So this entices peopleto start coming down and visiting us.
And we start getting visitors.
And they start coming down
(07:34):
and they start seeing us morebecause they want to come stay with us.
Right?
I like to think that
I was just like a super cute kidand they want to like, come visit with me.
But no, not really.They wanted to come down.
They wanted to sit there where it wasn'tsnowing and just enjoy being outside
again, having some sunshine,doing all the activities that they can't.
Four months up north.
(07:58):
Existing residents, whether
they be full timeor part time, reiterate tourism.
They reiterate an opportunity for peopleto come down
to visit you,to spend money in those communities.
We have 22 million people roughlyliving in Florida
full time, plus seasonal residentsthat are not included in that number.
(08:19):
People want to come see you.
They want to come seetheir friends and family.
Think about the last timethat someone you knew came and visited you
and how you spent money in your localcommunity and the communities around you,
where you went out to dinner,where you went shopping,
tourism is far more widespreadthan theme park corridors and beaches.
(08:41):
So we have to think
and we have to understandhow it affects these different communities
and how we can capturemore of those dollars
that may be availablein those communities.
Let's talk
about the sheer mass of tourismwe experience here in Florida.
It's simply crazy.
Visit Floridadoes a lot to tract the volume of tourism.
They’re primarily focused on out-of-statetravel and out-of-country travel.
(09:06):
So people who live somewhere elsefull time
and are coming down hereonly for vacation.
So when we talk about these volumenumbers,
they exclude Florida residentsand if you are like me,
you spend a lot of timevacationing in your own state.
There's so much to do here.
(09:26):
We go to Disney World all the time.
We go to different areas.
You go to South Florida,you go to Jacksonville, you travel
throughout the state and have staycationswithin our own communities all the time.
And that createsa whole other layer of out of area sales
that aren't tracked by these numbers.
So what does this
information from Visit Florida Researchactually tell us?
(09:49):
So when we look at this number,they're estimating $125
billion of visitor spending.
Tourism was the second largest employer.
Retail was a third.
In 2023, 135
million people were estimatedto visit Florida.
Again, not including any travelfrom full time or part time residents.
(10:12):
In those numbers, 135 million.
Our population, as we just talkedabout, is 22 million roughly.
It's like 22.6 right nowis the estimation.
So this is roughly six timesthe amount of people
who live herefull time visit here each year,
Visit Florida.
Research also tracks enplanements.
(10:32):
And if you don't know what enplanementsare, it means people getting on a plane.
And so that tells us the volumes
that we have at our airports,which are very, very high as well.
They estimate that we had 108million people
getting on planes in Florida in one year.
And this makes a lot of sensewhen you look at the concentration
of major international airportsthat we have in Florida.
(10:54):
You can go a couple of hourseach direction and get to another major
airport.
We have MCO in Orlando,we have Miami, we have Fort Lauderdale.
We have an airport in West Palm.
We have our RSW in Fort Myers.
We have TPA in Tampa, my favorite,we have Jacksonville.
There's other airports everywhere here.
The International Trade Association
(11:14):
tracks foreign travel,and we have a lot of that too in Florida.
We are the number one destinationin the United States
for foreign travelers, number one.
So of all 50 states,they choose to go here the most.
But it's not just the most.
30% of foreign travelers, 30%.
So they have 50 states to choose fromand they choose to come to Florida
(11:38):
30% of the time.
We have a lot of cruise activityin Florida.
Cruise Lines International Associationtracks the amount of cruise activity
and their numbers are just mind blowing.
We have three of the four busiest portsin the entire world,
(12:00):
not our country,not our continent, the entire world.
Three of the four busiest cruiseports are in Florida.
We have Port Miami.We have Port Canaveral.
We have Port Everglades,
which is in Fort Lauderdale,very close proximity to Port Miami.
We also have another port in Tampa.
We have half of all cruisesin our entire country.
leave from Florida; 53% of cruisesin our country leave from Florida.
(12:25):
They estimatewe have 11 million passengers in 2022.
So why do cruises matter?
I mean, people are getting on a boatand they're going somewhere else.
And I didn't understand this untilI worked on a on a development of a port.
And when I was working on the development,we learned that cruises
operate much different than other travel,that people generally
(12:45):
have to come down and create this bufferso that they don't miss the cruise.
It is not like an airplane.
There's not like one in a couple of hoursor even the next day.
If you miss your cruise,you miss the cruise.
So people come down,they come down a couple of days before;
they create that buffer.
They enjoy other things in the community.
And that way,if their airplane plane is delayed
or a storm happensand they can't drive down or whatever
(13:07):
the reason may be,they don't actually miss the cruise.
So generally, a couple of daysbefore the cruises is or even longer,
there is more tourismthat happens in our local communities
from the people who come downand go on cruises.
So cruises are pretty influential.
They're driving a mass of peoplethat are relative to half are full time
(13:28):
population, right. 11 million people.
We have 22 million peopleliving in the state.
So roughly a mass of half of our full time
population is coming down hereevery year to go on cruises.
And then they're taking some time
before that cruise and spending more moneyin our local communities.
We justtalked about the magnitude of tourism
(13:50):
that exists in Floridaand how it filters into local communities.
So why can't we see this informationon a demographic report?
Why is this information missing?
But we often have
people come to us and say, I have travelspending information in my demographics.
I can see how much money is being spenton travel.
What you're saying is wrong,but that that isn't what that's saying.
(14:10):
And so the government had abandoned
tracking the destinationspending of travel a while ago.
It was highly aired.
It was very expensive.
And you can think about how hard it wouldbe to answer those questions, right.
If I had a listof all the different places
I went to throughout the yearand I had an answer where I went
and how much I spent on each categoryin all these different areas.
(14:31):
I don't know if I would be able to do thatwithout spending a lot of time,
and I probably wouldn't spend the timeto do that in turn in that survey.
But I could probably tell you how muchI budget it for the entire year on travel.
And so that's what information is showntypically in demographics
related to travel.
We're talking about the expendituresof someone who lives in that community
(14:52):
and what they would spend on alltheir travel budget for the entire year
to a variety of destinations.
So say it's $1,000 per household.
What that information then, would tell usthat whatever community you are
looking at, say you're looking at Tampa,that the people who live in Tampa
spend on average $1,000 per yearwhen they travel to other places.
(15:13):
And that may be one trip that they go toand maybe five trips that they go to.
It's just the total budget for travel.
So you can look at itas a wealth component,
but it doesn't tell us anything
about the amount of money being spentby tourists in these communities.
So we have these
full time residents and we have tourism,
(15:36):
so we have peoplewho come down on vacation,
but we also have a very large populationof people who only live here part time.
Some people call them seasonal residents,some people call them winter residents.
We call them snowbirds, and they all tendto come down around the same time
because the weatheris particularly nicer here
(15:57):
than in other parts of the countryduring this time.
So we tend to find peoplewho have two homes now.
They may rent their home down here orthey may have a second home that they own.
So but they're able to afford a full timeresident somewhere else,
and then they're able to come down hereand either pay a very high rental rate
during that time of year,at sometimes three times
(16:20):
what an annual rental would bejust for that time of year
or to own a second homethat they're only using part of the year.
So these people generallyhave a higher wealth than we would assume
they would have a higher wealththan what a lot of the income would show.
And we see them
staying for somewherebetween 4 to 6 months typically.
(16:42):
They generally want to get home beforethat six month mark
just so that they can keep their residencyin their other state
and wherever they may liveor other country.
So generally we see people not stayingpast that six month part.
We start seeing peoplestart to come down here in October.
That's when it starts
to get a little cold in other places,in other parts of the country.
(17:05):
And we start seeing people come down hereat that time of year.
Fall is very pleasant and very nice,especially once we get into November.
By November, normally people are havehad their first cold snap where they live
and theythen are more motivated to be here.
So some additional people come down then.
But some people wait, though,until after Thanksgiving,
(17:27):
after the December holidaysand then you really start to see
people down here in January.
And by January, it'sa very cold in other parts of the country.
So after the new year, we start to seethe largest mass of people come here.
So between January and through April,
is our very high peak time to be here.
(17:47):
During that time, we start seeing peoplego back around April, starts
getting a little nicer, spring startsand it's not as cold in other parts
of the country and everyone talks about itbeing around Easter,
which the timing is true,but it's really around tax day.
A lot of people want to be back home.
They want to look at their recordsand their paperwork
that are back up at their full timeresidence.
(18:09):
So after April,some people stay through May
and it does start to get very quietby June.
It gets a lot hotter here,a lot more unpleasant for some people,
and it is a lot nicer in other partsof the country where they may live.
So we start seeing them go back.
It's also starts to be hurricaneseason here because of the heat.
(18:29):
And then during summer,we don't have a lot of tourism traffic
unless the market is dictated by peoplewho have children who are in school.
And you start seeing people come down,say, for Disney World or for a beach trip
with their family because they are focusedon the school year.
But the mass of the seasonal resident,Right.
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The mass of the seasonal resident
that comes down are hereduring that winter time frame.
So between October and Apriland primarily between January and April.
So as we get into summer,we do see in most markets
it gets very quietand it gets hard for a lot of these areas
in the a lot of the businesses,the retailers and the restaurants
(19:13):
and all the different businesses
in a shopping centerto make it during that time of year.
And as we get to Augustand as we get to September,
those are typically the lowest volumemonths in Florida for most businesses.
And it gets really hard to sort ofmake it through that time before the mass
of the seasonal residents come back downor start to come back down in October.
(19:34):
And obviously this varies by market
in some markets are more affectedby seasonal residents.
It used to be that if you were down southyou had the most effect
of the seasonal residents.
And then as you went further upthe state and went further north
and as it got colder, you were lessaffected by seasonal residents.
But that's really changed over the yearsas the areas have gotten built out
(19:55):
as it's gotten more expensiveto be further down south.
We've seen more of the northernpart of the state be developed
and have a large portionof seasonal residents.
Look at the villages, look at Ocala,
look at some of these pocketsthat are catering
to seasonal residents todayand that those market areas have changed.
So it's really spread throughout our state
(20:15):
and it does affect many different markets.
These are also people whothen when they're here,
are spending money in other communitiesand traveling to other communities.
And they may not be tracked by some ofthese tourism numbers as we spoke about.
So we just havea mass of people who come down
and they get sort of hiddenin these numbers.
They're not in the full timeresident numbers,
(20:37):
they're not in the tourismnumbers, they’re this other category.
Thereare ways to attract seasonal residents,
but many people choose not tolook at that information.
They rely on this more generalizationthat they hear.
And I grew up in Naples,which has a very heavy seasonal influence,
and you would hear peoplespeak about how the population expands.
(20:59):
But it was this generalization.
You know, peoplejust sort of spew out a number.
it doubles, it triples.
And then occasionallythere would be a study that was conducted
by the county or the local, you know,visitor bureaus and things of that nature.
But it wasn't consistent.
We couldn't rely on seeing this growthor those numbers.
There are ways to look at these numbersand look at the growth,
(21:21):
but most people do notlook at that information.
They rely on the generalization.
And you can also do much more detailedsales analysis to look at
how existing stores are operating,how the inventory is selling
through, to understand when they're hereand when they're not.
So let's talkabout timing of the seasonal resident.
We talked about these windowsthat they come down and the windows
(21:44):
are generally dictatedby how the economy's doing.
So we start to see people coming downearlier toward the October
and November time framesif the economy's very good
and we start to see them waitinguntil after the holidays,
until January and after New Year's,if the economy's not doing so good.
And sort of to explain the rationalebehind this is if you come down here
(22:08):
early, you may have childrenand grandchildren or other family
or other people you may want to be aroundduring the holidays that aren't here.
And so we see peoplewho travel for the holidays.
Maybe the family comes down hereto see them and have the holidays
down here.
Maybe they go and visit them backwhere they live and they fly back.
(22:28):
So after they've come down,
they may also go back hometo spend these holidays or vice versa.
But when the economy is tighter,when money is tighter,
peopledon't want to spend the money on flying.
So they delay their trip.
So maybe they delay itand they have Thanksgiving at home,
maybe they have Christmas at home andthen they come down after the new year.
(22:50):
So when the economy is not doing so well,we really see people
pushing the seasonal residencyto a start in January.
And it also is at that timewhen it gets really unbearable
in these other areas, it gets really coldand you don't want to be there.
And if there are renting a seasonalrental, it also helps control that cost.
They don't have six months of costs.
(23:11):
They now have four months of costs.
So depending on the economy,we see longer seasonal periods
and smaller seasonal periodsand it can really affect
how much sales are happeningin each of these communities.
My old boss always mentionedthat Florida was the first in
and the first out of economic crisis.
So as a whole country we were sort ofthe leader is the first one in
(23:34):
and the first went out.
And I think that's a very smart statement.
And that statement is surroundingaround our reliance
on these seasonal residents,our reliance on the tourism market.
And these are things that can be flexedwith economic need.
So when the economy is softer,you can pull back on these,
you know, non-necessities,right, of tourism and seasonal rentals.
(23:54):
And then as the economy startsbooming more,
these are the first thingsyou want to go back to.
You want to come to Florida,you want to come on vacation,
you want to come hereand be out of the cold.
You want to come here and rent a secondhome for 4 to 6 months of the year.
So you really have to think about that
these factors are highly relatedto the overall macro economy.
And that macro economy really does
(24:14):
filter down into local communitieswithin Florida.
One thing that I thinkwill be interesting to sort of observe
is we're already starting to see thisas work from home has become more popular
and the younger populationhas had access to work from home.
You've seen a shift of more seasonalitywith younger people.
Generally we see that the age of peoplewho are seasonal residents
(24:38):
who are coming down herepart time are retirees.
It's once they have that flexibility,but something that has really changed
since COVID and the expansion of workfrom home was younger populations
being able to come down hereand enjoy a more seasonal time of year
in time will tell if that continuesand time will tell if that is influential.
(24:59):
We are still a retirementbased seasonal resident
population and that probably will be forfor some time.
But we're starting to see thatthere are younger people who are now able
to take advantage of seasonal residency,are able to come down here
for longer periods of time.
And that really has changedand expands that portion of the economy
(25:19):
even more for us.There's more people to come down.
So it will be interestingto see how that plays out.
And if we continue to have more flexwith that, I think we're going to,
especially as more and more peoplecontinue to choose to not have children,
that they'll have more flexibility.
They won't have their kids in school.
They'll be able to come downhere, rent a house for a few months
and really live the lifestyle that theythey choose to live during that time.
(25:44):
In addition to expansion in
this younger segment,the baby boomers are continuing to retire.
They are huge generation.
There's a large amount of peoplethat will continue to retire
for approximately the next ten yearsor the next decade.
The younger end of the generationis about age 60,
so as these baby boomers continueto retire this large
(26:06):
segment of the population, we havepotential increases in seasonal residents
as well as full time population,as well as vacation, in all aspects.
Another thing that has really expandedthe seasonal market is the expansion
of Airbnb and VRBO and the other,you know, short term rental platforms.
And while there's a lot of headlines thattalks about how they're being restricted,
(26:28):
I've actually noticed how much moreaccepting the municipalities are,
how much more accepting the zoning is,and even the HOAs
of having short term rentals.
And this also continues to drivemore of a younger population
because they can come down in shorter timeperiods, they can come down using an app
or an online platform, which they prefer,and they just provides
(26:49):
more access to different peopleto become seasonal residents.
So you're probably at the pointwhere you're like, okay, I get it.
There's tourism, there are seasonalresidents, but why does this matter?
I understand they're here,but you're looking at research
and you're looking at
who's here and what their attributes areand how much money they make
(27:11):
and what their age is and what their needsmay be based on those demographics.
And you're looking at a 1and a 3 and a 5 mile
or a 10, and a 15, 20 minutedrive time area.
These numbers aren't included.
The demographics on these tourists,the demographics
on these seasonal residents are excludedfrom these numbers.
And it really skews who's in that market.
(27:34):
And what I often see is that there's realestate committees and national tenants
often have an office somewhere elseand not in Florida.
And a lot of the decisionmakers may not even come to the market.
They may not even see the store.
And they're looking and they're relying oninformation on full time residents.
I see real estate brokers
who are in the marketwho still rely on full time residency,
(27:56):
and they look at this informationthat excludes these other factors
and they're saying, well,we can't go to that market
because the income is just too low
or the age is not what we want it to be.
There's not enough population.
I don't know how anyone is making itthere.
There's other factorsdriving retail sales,
driving profitability.
(28:18):
So other people have figured it outsometimes or you see the converse
where people are going,
Well, the only place to go in PinellasCounty is probably Fourth Street
because they're the only placeI really see
the income being a mass that I can supportputting a store and having it fit
my typical demographicsthat I may put throughout the country.
But then they they go to that areaand they see it not perform maybe
(28:40):
as they thought it would, and then they'velimited where else they would go.
Well, we can't go anywhere elsebecause of back to work.
If that met our demographics,we we can't possibly go
to anywhere else in the areaand we're just not a fit for this area.
It's not as good as everyone saying.
So you see a lot of misunderstandingbecause we're only looking at the
segment of the population.
(29:01):
We're not understanding it based on whatthe needs of the community are.
We're only looking at oneportion of that community.
So what if
your store has the potentialto have 20% out of area, 50% out of area,
but you don't take the time to understandwho that consumer is
and serve that consumer.
Maybe they're already
coming to your store, butyou don't understand, again, their needs.
(29:25):
So maybe you don't deliver the inventorywhen they need it.
Maybe you miss out on months,maybe you have inventory spoilage
because you had it herewhen no one was buying it.
And so it's really important to tryto get a grasp on who your consumer is
and what the market potentialof the consumer is, not just who's
coming through your door, butwho else is available to drive more sales.
(29:49):
We started talking about two factorsat a very high level.
We talked about tourism,we talked about seasonal residents.
We talked about how the personmaking those purchasing decisions
may not be who you think they are.
It may not be their full time resident.
And there's waysthat you can look at this.
There's ways that you can analyzeseasonal residents better.
There's ways that you can analyzetourism better.
(30:09):
There's ways that you can analyze your own
sales databetter to understand the market.
All we're talking about
today is, is there somethingthat you're missing at your store?
Are you missingreaching a seasonal resident?
Are you missing reachingsomeone who's on vacation?
Are you underestimating those affectsin your markets?
Is there potential for you to increaseyour sales and increase your profit?
(30:33):
And does this change
how you invest in real estateor your marketing or your inventory?
Maybe
we have to continue to ask questionsto dig deeper
to get to the bottomof how this affects our retail.
Our restaurants are other types of storesthat are in shopping centers
and get more informationand find out what that potential is.
(30:56):
And we want to continue that conversationthrough this podcast.
So why a podcast, why am I here?
Why am I doing this?
What motivated me?
Well, we already talked about thatthis was this conversation
that kept coming up, and I keep having it.
It's not very efficient to have it
with each individual clientover and over and over again.
(31:17):
I was even on a panel and we're havingthat conversation on a greater scale,
and we're talking about how unique Floridais and was a fabulous panel.
We had Woolbright Development,we had Bealls, we had Dutch Brothers,
Coffee, we have myself, and we're talkingabout all this uniqueness
that happens in Floridaand why it's so hot in retail right now.
But it was truncated.
(31:37):
It was just a short conversation?
We could not have the full discussion,so that's why I'm here.
I want to have a more full discussion.
I want to talk to different perspectives.
I want to hear about from real estateand marketing and inventory
and operators and landlords and tenantsand have all these different perspectives
that we can talk about.
(31:57):
And together we can go on discoveryand find out who the Florida consumer
is, what their needs are,and how to better serve them.
But we can't do this without your support.
This is our first episode.People don't know about us yet.
Please share this with your friends, withother people you know in the industry.
Help us get the word out so that we canreach the potential of this conversation.
(32:21):
Like, comment,and subscribe to the podcast,
make a comment, make it interesting,make it arbitrary, make it good.
We want to hear from you.
We want to continue this conversationwith your support.
So what's next?
Where do we go from here?
Well, we're going to have oneepisode a month, so our next
(32:42):
edition will be our May edition episode,and we're going to talk about growth
and how growth is everywhere in Florida,but also hidden and really misunderstood.
And we're going to have a conversationabout how it affects Florida retail.
Welcome to the Show Me Sun Money
a podcastabout how money is made in Florida retail.
I'm your host Britta Eriksson.
So have you been on I-75 latelyor any interstate in Florida?
Doesn't it feel so good.
You can just feel the traffic levels
sort of simmer downand the tension has just gone away.
(00:24):
It's fantastic right now,
the weather is beautifulAnd of course, it's April, right?
We're all feeling really goodabout being a local and being a Floridian,
but we start to think the traffic islower, we're going into summer.
And with that, that means retail salesare on their decline to our lowest
volume months.
(00:45):
We've reached our seasonal highin almost every market.
And we are going to start shifting downto much lower sales volumes,
where it gets really hardfor a lot of people to make it
and keep their doorsopen in August and September.
This happens for all kinds of retail,whether it be a store, a retail shop,
a restaurant, a gym, a salon,an entertainment business,
(01:07):
anything that would operatein a shopping center doesn't survive
just on the locals here.
The people like you and me who live here.
It survives on a multitude of differentfactors,
many factors that many, many peoplemisunderstand and underestimate.
They plan their inventories wrong,they plan their real estate wrong,
(01:28):
and they miss out on who the true
consumer is,who is spending the money at their stores.
So that's what we're here to talk about.
This episode is calledThe Myth of the Florida Man.
And we're talking about the importanceof the local community
versus other factors that exist in Floridaand how they influence Florida retail.
(01:50):
So what
type of influence are we talking aboutwhen we start to have this conversation?
People think that it is limited to Disney
or the beachesand it's this couple percent.
And that's not what we see when we look atthe data, when we have really good data.
And when I've looked at customerlevel data, we see that those influences
of out of area sales are huge.
(02:12):
And even the most suburban marketsin Florida markets you wouldn't
assumehave large outside of area influences.
And we look at those salesand we're seeing on the low end,
I've seen about 20%.
I've seen on the higher end over 50%,I've even seen
70% out of area sales.
And obviously for different users,this is going to affect them differently.
(02:35):
And other people may havea different response to this.
And in different marketsit may be different.
So I want to have this conversation.
I'm not coming to you as an expert.
I'm not coming to give you adviceon how to operate your business.
But I believe it's a topic that we deserveto give a little bit more attention.
I have this conversationvery often with different clients
(02:56):
when we're looking at location decisions,when we're looking at the markets
and analyzing who the consumer is
and how they can do better in the market,where they can locate to do better.
You know, we look at this and we have thesame conversation and it's very similar,
whether it be a local mom and pop shopwho's relocating to Florida
and opening their business here,maybe from New York or Chicago, Ohio,
(03:18):
even Georgia,or whether it's a national retailer
and they're looking to open storesin the state,
I find that they try to use this equationthat they've had success with
these are very smart business operatorsand they've operated in other parts of
the country where they found the successand they apply the same equation here.
But they're so confusedwhy their results are different
(03:40):
and they don't understandthe magnitude of these other factors
that exist in Floridaand why it matters to look at them.
So it's no secret that we havethe most visited theme
park in the entire worldlocated in Florida.
And of course, with that theme parkwith three additional sister theme parks,
with them having two additional waterparks, with there being a lot more theme
(04:03):
parks, a lot of people come to Floridaand do go to theme parks.
It is a main driver of tourismand a lot of tourism
dollars are spent in the communitiesaround those theme parks.
So what kind of numbersare we talking about related
just to theme parks to those areas?
(04:24):
According to themeentertainment association,
we have 77 million visitors
at Florida theme parks out of the top
11 theme parks in North America.
We have eight of them located in Florida.
The other three are located in California.
And that makes sense, right?We both have really good weather.
(04:45):
We can operate year roundand we get more sales, more dollars,
more visits at our theme parksbecause their weather allows for it.
We have the top fourwater parks in the entire country,
but tourism in Florida is
much more than just theme parksor beaches.
The sheer mass of tourism spreads out
(05:08):
and filters outside these areasbecause there's so much of it
and it filters to local communitiesthroughout the state
because the main driver of tourismin Florida is our weather
and the sunshine.
I should take a moment.
I want you to reframe your thoughtsand what you know
(05:29):
about tourismand what you think you know about tourism
and think about how your friendsand family visit you.
If you are a Floridian,if you are living here,
especially if you are from somewhere upnorth, that is cold.
Your friends and family want to come here.
They now have an end to come here, right?
(05:49):
They know you.
You live hereand you probably have people who come down
and either stay with you or stay near you.
And you probably don't live in the beachcommunity or in the theme park community.
So I'll tell you a little storyabout when we first moved down here.
I was a kid.
We are from Chicago, and pretty much
(06:10):
everyone else we knowstill lives in Chicago at that point.
They still lived in the coldand the snow and the gray and the drear.
And my parents were just done with it.
They were done with raising
small kids there and they wantedthey wanted to move to Florida.
So once we moved here, they were very,
very proud that we moved to Florida.
(06:31):
And of course, on our first Christmascard,
my parents, you know, really show offthat we live in Florida.
So me and my brother in the pooljust every day and my parents take this
really cute picture, I still have it of meand my brother swimming in the pool
during December,when it's snowing up north.
And of course, they do the *** moveand they send that to
(06:53):
all their friendswho are in Chicago and market saying
how great it ishere and *** it is where you live.
So then all of them get this cardand they get this letter.
That we swim in the pool on Christmas Daywithout a heater.
Your kids are in parkas,you're in snow suits
that you can't even put your armsand you have to shovel snow.
(07:13):
You can't even drive down the roadfor work.
You know what, our kidsdon't even have to wear clothes.
They're just out like half naked,
running around the backyardin bathing suits just all the time.
We don't need clothes down here.
It's that warm. It's that much better.
So this entices peopleto start coming down and visiting us.
And we start getting visitors.
And they start coming down
(07:34):
and they start seeing us morebecause they want to come stay with us.
Right?
I like to think that
I was just like a super cute kidand they want to like, come visit with me.
But no, not really.They wanted to come down.
They wanted to sit there where it wasn'tsnowing and just enjoy being outside
again, having some sunshine,doing all the activities that they can't.
Four months up north.
(07:58):
Existing residents, whether
they be full timeor part time, reiterate tourism.
They reiterate an opportunity for peopleto come down
to visit you,to spend money in those communities.
We have 22 million people roughlyliving in Florida
full time, plus seasonal residentsthat are not included in that number.
(08:19):
People want to come see you.
They want to come seetheir friends and family.
Think about the last timethat someone you knew came and visited you
and how you spent money in your localcommunity and the communities around you,
where you went out to dinner,where you went shopping,
tourism is far more widespreadthan theme park corridors and beaches.
(08:41):
So we have to think
and we have to understandhow it affects these different communities
and how we can capturemore of those dollars
that may be availablein those communities.
Let's talk
about the sheer mass of tourismwe experience here in Florida.
It's simply crazy.
Visit Floridadoes a lot to tract the volume of tourism.
They’re primarily focused on out-of-statetravel and out-of-country travel.
(09:06):
So people who live somewhere elsefull time
and are coming down hereonly for vacation.
So when we talk about these volumenumbers,
they exclude Florida residentsand if you are like me,
you spend a lot of timevacationing in your own state.
There's so much to do here.
(09:26):
We go to Disney World all the time.
We go to different areas.
You go to South Florida,you go to Jacksonville, you travel
throughout the state and have staycationswithin our own communities all the time.
And that createsa whole other layer of out of area sales
that aren't tracked by these numbers.
So what does this
information from Visit Florida Researchactually tell us?
(09:49):
So when we look at this number,they're estimating $125
billion of visitor spending.
Tourism was the second largest employer.
Retail was a third.
In 2023, 135
million people were estimatedto visit Florida.
Again, not including any travelfrom full time or part time residents.
(10:12):
In those numbers, 135 million.
Our population, as we just talkedabout, is 22 million roughly.
It's like 22.6 right nowis the estimation.
So this is roughly six timesthe amount of people
who live herefull time visit here each year,
Visit Florida.
Research also tracks enplanements.
(10:32):
And if you don't know what enplanementsare, it means people getting on a plane.
And so that tells us the volumes
that we have at our airports,which are very, very high as well.
They estimate that we had 108million people
getting on planes in Florida in one year.
And this makes a lot of sensewhen you look at the concentration
of major international airportsthat we have in Florida.
(10:54):
You can go a couple of hourseach direction and get to another major
airport.
We have MCO in Orlando,we have Miami, we have Fort Lauderdale.
We have an airport in West Palm.
We have our RSW in Fort Myers.
We have TPA in Tampa, my favorite,we have Jacksonville.
There's other airports everywhere here.
The International Trade Association
(11:14):
tracks foreign travel,and we have a lot of that too in Florida.
We are the number one destinationin the United States
for foreign travelers, number one.
So of all 50 states,they choose to go here the most.
But it's not just the most.
30% of foreign travelers, 30%.
So they have 50 states to choose fromand they choose to come to Florida
(11:38):
30% of the time.
We have a lot of cruise activityin Florida.
Cruise Lines International Associationtracks the amount of cruise activity
and their numbers are just mind blowing.
We have three of the four busiest portsin the entire world,
(12:00):
not our country,not our continent, the entire world.
Three of the four busiest cruiseports are in Florida.
We have Port Miami.We have Port Canaveral.
We have Port Everglades,
which is in Fort Lauderdale,very close proximity to Port Miami.
We also have another port in Tampa.
We have half of all cruisesin our entire country.
leave from Florida; 53% of cruisesin our country leave from Florida.
(12:25):
They estimatewe have 11 million passengers in 2022.
So why do cruises matter?
I mean, people are getting on a boatand they're going somewhere else.
And I didn't understand this untilI worked on a on a development of a port.
And when I was working on the development,we learned that cruises
operate much different than other travel,that people generally
(12:45):
have to come down and create this bufferso that they don't miss the cruise.
It is not like an airplane.
There's not like one in a couple of hoursor even the next day.
If you miss your cruise,you miss the cruise.
So people come down,they come down a couple of days before;
they create that buffer.
They enjoy other things in the community.
And that way,if their airplane plane is delayed
or a storm happensand they can't drive down or whatever
(13:07):
the reason may be,they don't actually miss the cruise.
So generally, a couple of daysbefore the cruises is or even longer,
there is more tourismthat happens in our local communities
from the people who come downand go on cruises.
So cruises are pretty influential.
They're driving a mass of peoplethat are relative to half are full time
(13:28):
population, right. 11 million people.
We have 22 million peopleliving in the state.
So roughly a mass of half of our full time
population is coming down hereevery year to go on cruises.
And then they're taking some time
before that cruise and spending more moneyin our local communities.
We justtalked about the magnitude of tourism
(13:50):
that exists in Floridaand how it filters into local communities.
So why can't we see this informationon a demographic report?
Why is this information missing?
But we often have
people come to us and say, I have travelspending information in my demographics.
I can see how much money is being spenton travel.
What you're saying is wrong,but that that isn't what that's saying.
(14:10):
And so the government had abandoned
tracking the destinationspending of travel a while ago.
It was highly aired.
It was very expensive.
And you can think about how hard it wouldbe to answer those questions, right.
If I had a listof all the different places
I went to throughout the yearand I had an answer where I went
and how much I spent on each categoryin all these different areas.
(14:31):
I don't know if I would be able to do thatwithout spending a lot of time,
and I probably wouldn't spend the timeto do that in turn in that survey.
But I could probably tell you how muchI budget it for the entire year on travel.
And so that's what information is showntypically in demographics
related to travel.
We're talking about the expendituresof someone who lives in that community
(14:52):
and what they would spend on alltheir travel budget for the entire year
to a variety of destinations.
So say it's $1,000 per household.
What that information then, would tell usthat whatever community you are
looking at, say you're looking at Tampa,that the people who live in Tampa
spend on average $1,000 per yearwhen they travel to other places.
(15:13):
And that may be one trip that they go toand maybe five trips that they go to.
It's just the total budget for travel.
So you can look at itas a wealth component,
but it doesn't tell us anything
about the amount of money being spentby tourists in these communities.
So we have these
full time residents and we have tourism,
(15:36):
so we have peoplewho come down on vacation,
but we also have a very large populationof people who only live here part time.
Some people call them seasonal residents,some people call them winter residents.
We call them snowbirds, and they all tendto come down around the same time
because the weatheris particularly nicer here
(15:57):
than in other parts of the countryduring this time.
So we tend to find peoplewho have two homes now.
They may rent their home down here orthey may have a second home that they own.
So but they're able to afford a full timeresident somewhere else,
and then they're able to come down hereand either pay a very high rental rate
during that time of year,at sometimes three times
(16:20):
what an annual rental would bejust for that time of year
or to own a second homethat they're only using part of the year.
So these people generallyhave a higher wealth than we would assume
they would have a higher wealththan what a lot of the income would show.
And we see them
staying for somewherebetween 4 to 6 months typically.
(16:42):
They generally want to get home beforethat six month mark
just so that they can keep their residencyin their other state
and wherever they may liveor other country.
So generally we see people not stayingpast that six month part.
We start seeing peoplestart to come down here in October.
That's when it starts
to get a little cold in other places,in other parts of the country.
(17:05):
And we start seeing people come down hereat that time of year.
Fall is very pleasant and very nice,especially once we get into November.
By November, normally people are havehad their first cold snap where they live
and theythen are more motivated to be here.
So some additional people come down then.
But some people wait, though,until after Thanksgiving,
(17:27):
after the December holidaysand then you really start to see
people down here in January.
And by January, it'sa very cold in other parts of the country.
So after the new year, we start to seethe largest mass of people come here.
So between January and through April,
is our very high peak time to be here.
(17:47):
During that time, we start seeing peoplego back around April, starts
getting a little nicer, spring startsand it's not as cold in other parts
of the country and everyone talks about itbeing around Easter,
which the timing is true,but it's really around tax day.
A lot of people want to be back home.
They want to look at their recordsand their paperwork
that are back up at their full timeresidence.
(18:09):
So after April,some people stay through May
and it does start to get very quietby June.
It gets a lot hotter here,a lot more unpleasant for some people,
and it is a lot nicer in other partsof the country where they may live.
So we start seeing them go back.
It's also starts to be hurricaneseason here because of the heat.
(18:29):
And then during summer,we don't have a lot of tourism traffic
unless the market is dictated by peoplewho have children who are in school.
And you start seeing people come down,say, for Disney World or for a beach trip
with their family because they are focusedon the school year.
But the mass of the seasonal resident,Right.
(18:51):
The mass of the seasonal resident
that comes down are hereduring that winter time frame.
So between October and Apriland primarily between January and April.
So as we get into summer,we do see in most markets
it gets very quietand it gets hard for a lot of these areas
in the a lot of the businesses,the retailers and the restaurants
(19:13):
and all the different businesses
in a shopping centerto make it during that time of year.
And as we get to Augustand as we get to September,
those are typically the lowest volumemonths in Florida for most businesses.
And it gets really hard to sort ofmake it through that time before the mass
of the seasonal residents come back downor start to come back down in October.
(19:34):
And obviously this varies by market
in some markets are more affectedby seasonal residents.
It used to be that if you were down southyou had the most effect
of the seasonal residents.
And then as you went further upthe state and went further north
and as it got colder, you were lessaffected by seasonal residents.
But that's really changed over the yearsas the areas have gotten built out
(19:55):
as it's gotten more expensiveto be further down south.
We've seen more of the northernpart of the state be developed
and have a large portionof seasonal residents.
Look at the villages, look at Ocala,
look at some of these pocketsthat are catering
to seasonal residents todayand that those market areas have changed.
So it's really spread throughout our state
(20:15):
and it does affect many different markets.
These are also people whothen when they're here,
are spending money in other communitiesand traveling to other communities.
And they may not be tracked by some ofthese tourism numbers as we spoke about.
So we just havea mass of people who come down
and they get sort of hiddenin these numbers.
They're not in the full timeresident numbers,
(20:37):
they're not in the tourismnumbers, they’re this other category.
Thereare ways to attract seasonal residents,
but many people choose not tolook at that information.
They rely on this more generalizationthat they hear.
And I grew up in Naples,which has a very heavy seasonal influence,
and you would hear peoplespeak about how the population expands.
(20:59):
But it was this generalization.
You know, peoplejust sort of spew out a number.
it doubles, it triples.
And then occasionallythere would be a study that was conducted
by the county or the local, you know,visitor bureaus and things of that nature.
But it wasn't consistent.
We couldn't rely on seeing this growthor those numbers.
There are ways to look at these numbersand look at the growth,
(21:21):
but most people do notlook at that information.
They rely on the generalization.
And you can also do much more detailedsales analysis to look at
how existing stores are operating,how the inventory is selling
through, to understand when they're hereand when they're not.
So let's talkabout timing of the seasonal resident.
We talked about these windowsthat they come down and the windows
(21:44):
are generally dictatedby how the economy's doing.
So we start to see people coming downearlier toward the October
and November time framesif the economy's very good
and we start to see them waitinguntil after the holidays,
until January and after New Year's,if the economy's not doing so good.
And sort of to explain the rationalebehind this is if you come down here
(22:08):
early, you may have childrenand grandchildren or other family
or other people you may want to be aroundduring the holidays that aren't here.
And so we see peoplewho travel for the holidays.
Maybe the family comes down hereto see them and have the holidays
down here.
Maybe they go and visit them backwhere they live and they fly back.
(22:28):
So after they've come down,
they may also go back hometo spend these holidays or vice versa.
But when the economy is tighter,when money is tighter,
peopledon't want to spend the money on flying.
So they delay their trip.
So maybe they delay itand they have Thanksgiving at home,
maybe they have Christmas at home andthen they come down after the new year.
(22:50):
So when the economy is not doing so well,we really see people
pushing the seasonal residencyto a start in January.
And it also is at that timewhen it gets really unbearable
in these other areas, it gets really coldand you don't want to be there.
And if there are renting a seasonalrental, it also helps control that cost.
They don't have six months of costs.
(23:11):
They now have four months of costs.
So depending on the economy,we see longer seasonal periods
and smaller seasonal periodsand it can really affect
how much sales are happeningin each of these communities.
My old boss always mentionedthat Florida was the first in
and the first out of economic crisis.
So as a whole country we were sort ofthe leader is the first one in
(23:34):
and the first went out.
And I think that's a very smart statement.
And that statement is surroundingaround our reliance
on these seasonal residents,our reliance on the tourism market.
And these are things that can be flexedwith economic need.
So when the economy is softer,you can pull back on these,
you know, non-necessities,right, of tourism and seasonal rentals.
(23:54):
And then as the economy startsbooming more,
these are the first thingsyou want to go back to.
You want to come to Florida,you want to come on vacation,
you want to come hereand be out of the cold.
You want to come here and rent a secondhome for 4 to 6 months of the year.
So you really have to think about that
these factors are highly relatedto the overall macro economy.
And that macro economy really does
(24:14):
filter down into local communitieswithin Florida.
One thing that I thinkwill be interesting to sort of observe
is we're already starting to see thisas work from home has become more popular
and the younger populationhas had access to work from home.
You've seen a shift of more seasonalitywith younger people.
Generally we see that the age of peoplewho are seasonal residents
(24:38):
who are coming down herepart time are retirees.
It's once they have that flexibility,but something that has really changed
since COVID and the expansion of workfrom home was younger populations
being able to come down hereand enjoy a more seasonal time of year
in time will tell if that continuesand time will tell if that is influential.
(24:59):
We are still a retirementbased seasonal resident
population and that probably will be forfor some time.
But we're starting to see thatthere are younger people who are now able
to take advantage of seasonal residency,are able to come down here
for longer periods of time.
And that really has changedand expands that portion of the economy
(25:19):
even more for us.There's more people to come down.
So it will be interestingto see how that plays out.
And if we continue to have more flexwith that, I think we're going to,
especially as more and more peoplecontinue to choose to not have children,
that they'll have more flexibility.
They won't have their kids in school.
They'll be able to come downhere, rent a house for a few months
and really live the lifestyle that theythey choose to live during that time.
(25:44):
In addition to expansion in
this younger segment,the baby boomers are continuing to retire.
They are huge generation.
There's a large amount of peoplethat will continue to retire
for approximately the next ten yearsor the next decade.
The younger end of the generationis about age 60,
so as these baby boomers continueto retire this large
(26:06):
segment of the population, we havepotential increases in seasonal residents
as well as full time population,as well as vacation, in all aspects.
Another thing that has really expandedthe seasonal market is the expansion
of Airbnb and VRBO and the other,you know, short term rental platforms.
And while there's a lot of headlines thattalks about how they're being restricted,
(26:28):
I've actually noticed how much moreaccepting the municipalities are,
how much more accepting the zoning is,and even the HOAs
of having short term rentals.
And this also continues to drivemore of a younger population
because they can come down in shorter timeperiods, they can come down using an app
or an online platform, which they prefer,and they just provides
(26:49):
more access to different peopleto become seasonal residents.
So you're probably at the pointwhere you're like, okay, I get it.
There's tourism, there are seasonalresidents, but why does this matter?
I understand they're here,but you're looking at research
and you're looking at
who's here and what their attributes areand how much money they make
(27:11):
and what their age is and what their needsmay be based on those demographics.
And you're looking at a 1and a 3 and a 5 mile
or a 10, and a 15, 20 minutedrive time area.
These numbers aren't included.
The demographics on these tourists,the demographics
on these seasonal residents are excludedfrom these numbers.
And it really skews who's in that market.
(27:34):
And what I often see is that there's realestate committees and national tenants
often have an office somewhere elseand not in Florida.
And a lot of the decisionmakers may not even come to the market.
They may not even see the store.
And they're looking and they're relying oninformation on full time residents.
I see real estate brokers
who are in the marketwho still rely on full time residency,
(27:56):
and they look at this informationthat excludes these other factors
and they're saying, well,we can't go to that market
because the income is just too low
or the age is not what we want it to be.
There's not enough population.
I don't know how anyone is making itthere.
There's other factorsdriving retail sales,
driving profitability.
(28:18):
So other people have figured it outsometimes or you see the converse
where people are going,
Well, the only place to go in PinellasCounty is probably Fourth Street
because they're the only placeI really see
the income being a mass that I can supportputting a store and having it fit
my typical demographicsthat I may put throughout the country.
But then they they go to that areaand they see it not perform maybe
(28:40):
as they thought it would, and then they'velimited where else they would go.
Well, we can't go anywhere elsebecause of back to work.
If that met our demographics,we we can't possibly go
to anywhere else in the areaand we're just not a fit for this area.
It's not as good as everyone saying.
So you see a lot of misunderstandingbecause we're only looking at the
segment of the population.
(29:01):
We're not understanding it based on whatthe needs of the community are.
We're only looking at oneportion of that community.
So what if
your store has the potentialto have 20% out of area, 50% out of area,
but you don't take the time to understandwho that consumer is
and serve that consumer.
Maybe they're already
coming to your store, butyou don't understand, again, their needs.
(29:25):
So maybe you don't deliver the inventorywhen they need it.
Maybe you miss out on months,maybe you have inventory spoilage
because you had it herewhen no one was buying it.
And so it's really important to tryto get a grasp on who your consumer is
and what the market potentialof the consumer is, not just who's
coming through your door, butwho else is available to drive more sales.
(29:49):
We started talking about two factorsat a very high level.
We talked about tourism,we talked about seasonal residents.
We talked about how the personmaking those purchasing decisions
may not be who you think they are.
It may not be their full time resident.
And there's waysthat you can look at this.
There's ways that you can analyzeseasonal residents better.
There's ways that you can analyzetourism better.
(30:09):
There's ways that you can analyze your own
sales databetter to understand the market.
All we're talking about
today is, is there somethingthat you're missing at your store?
Are you missingreaching a seasonal resident?
Are you missing reachingsomeone who's on vacation?
Are you underestimating those affectsin your markets?
Is there potential for you to increaseyour sales and increase your profit?
(30:33):
And does this change
how you invest in real estateor your marketing or your inventory?
Maybe
we have to continue to ask questionsto dig deeper
to get to the bottomof how this affects our retail.
Our restaurants are other types of storesthat are in shopping centers
and get more informationand find out what that potential is.
(30:56):
And we want to continue that conversationthrough this podcast.
So why a podcast, why am I here?
Why am I doing this?
What motivated me?
Well, we already talked about thatthis was this conversation
that kept coming up, and I keep having it.
It's not very efficient to have it
with each individual clientover and over and over again.
(31:17):
I was even on a panel and we're havingthat conversation on a greater scale,
and we're talking about how unique Floridais and was a fabulous panel.
We had Woolbright Development,we had Bealls, we had Dutch Brothers,
Coffee, we have myself, and we're talkingabout all this uniqueness
that happens in Floridaand why it's so hot in retail right now.
But it was truncated.
(31:37):
It was just a short conversation?
We could not have the full discussion,so that's why I'm here.
I want to have a more full discussion.
I want to talk to different perspectives.
I want to hear about from real estateand marketing and inventory
and operators and landlords and tenantsand have all these different perspectives
that we can talk about.
(31:57):
And together we can go on discoveryand find out who the Florida consumer
is, what their needs are,and how to better serve them.
But we can't do this without your support.
This is our first episode.People don't know about us yet.
Please share this with your friends, withother people you know in the industry.
Help us get the word out so that we canreach the potential of this conversation.
(32:21):
Like, comment,and subscribe to the podcast,
make a comment, make it interesting,make it arbitrary, make it good.
We want to hear from you.
We want to continue this conversationwith your support.
So what's next?
Where do we go from here?
Well, we're going to have oneepisode a month, so our next
(32:42):
edition will be our May edition episode,and we're going to talk about growth
and how growth is everywhere in Florida,but also hidden and really misunderstood.
And we're going to have a conversationabout how it affects Florida retail.
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