Santa Maria Valley tourism industry positioned to remain strong despite high gas prices
SANTA MARIA, Calif. -- Despite record-breaking gas prices, the Santa Maria Valley tourism industry looks to be well-positioned to remain strong heading into the travel season.
Due to its geographic position in California, the area may in fact stand to benefit from increasing gas prices, which are likely to remain at high levels over the next several months.
"Although gas prices are up, people still want to travel and they just want smaller destinations and smaller travel time," said Jennifer Harrison, Santa Maria Chamber Tourism Director. "When people start looking at destinations to travel to, they want something close. They want something near the coast, which is ideal, and we're eight miles from the coastline, and so it makes us that prime destination."
Due to its geography, the Santa Maria Valley, and the entire Central Coast, is in an ideal location to take advantage of visitors who may wish to reduce their travel budgets.
"There may be folks that are coming out of the Central Valley or LA Basin that still want to get away, but maybe they need some place closer to home, so maybe there were planning a trip to do the national parks through the mountain west, or something like that, and that becomes a little cost prohibitive," said Glenn Morris, Santa Maria Valley Chamber CEO/President. "Maybe they're looking a little closer and maybe they discover Santa Maria, so we think there is some potential win opportunities for the tourism."
Morris added that tourism is an extremely vital piece of the Santa Maria Valley economy, so keeping visitors coming to the area is a point of emphasis.
"Tourism is one of the foundation industries here in the Santa Maria Valley," said Morris. "It may not always be the largest revenue generator for the city, but it's really one of those important pieces that kind of provides the ongoing revenues and also builds our quality of life."
He added the transient occupancy tax, also referred to as TOT, or bed tax, which is the charge added onto overnight lodging bills, raised more than $3 million for Santa Maria last year.
"We've been really impressed with the work our hotels and our hospitality partners have been doing, and as a result of that, and then people have been looking for ways they can travel and get out and do some things and found the Santa Maria worked for that," said Morris. "2021 was one of the best years the city has had in terms of tourism revenue."
