EP 52: ALL EYES ARE ON TAMPA BAY: The Impact of COVID-19 and the Road to the Super Bowl

We are living in an unprecedented time, and the big question right now is, do we travel? Who better to ask to go “On The Record” with an answer than Santiago Corrada, president and CEO of Visit Tampa Bay. In this episode, Santiago joins Sarina Fazan to discuss how to travel safely during this pandemic, what’s in store for Tampa Bay – including Super Bowl LV in February 2021 – and how he transitioned from an educator to a champion for the local tourism industry! Santiago reminds us that, while it’s easy to do the right thing while everyone is watching, it’s even more important to do the right thing while no one is watching. With major events for Tampa Bay being planned for 2021, all eyes are on Tampa Bay right now, and the city has plans to do it right!

As a trusted community resource, Visit Tampa Bay is working hard to instill traveler confidence and to help visitors safely experience Tampa Bay. Santiago explains, “As far as safety, I think the safety factors are there, but it’s a very personal decision. We’re actually seeing people now more willing to travel, and we’re starting to see it even during the surges of the pandemic.”

“We’ve been setting records for years and for months. In fact, just in February of this year, of 2020, hotel occupancy in Hillsborough County was 87.8 percent. And, if you think about that, that’s almost nine out of every ten hotel rooms were being occupied,” Santiago states.

Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March, right at the peak of tourism season. All of the Tampa Bay region’s top attractions were closed, international travel stopped, cruise ships were docked, and local businesses were shuttered. Hotel occupancy rates fell to about 22 percent in April, but Santiago reveals that there’s been a steady increase since then.

“I think we’re doing fairly well, under the conditions we’re in,” Santiago says.

He also believes that the hotels in the Tampa Bay area, and nationwide, are taking significant precautions for guest health and safety, working to ensure that rooms are sanitized and interactions with staff are limited. Santiago says, “I can tell you that in our destination here in Tampa, Hillsborough County, everyone is taking safety very seriously.”

He adds, “I encourage travel, I’ve done it myself. But I would say even for our locals, please remember that there are so many jobs tied to tourism. So, when we actually stay in a hotel, we’re providing a job for a lot of people in that hotel that are our neighbors. These are not outsiders; these are people who live in our community. When you go out and you eat at a restaurant or you shop at local retail, those are tourism things.”

He elaborates that, when you support local businesses, you also contribute to the quality of life in the region through transportation, education, and sales taxes.

Santiago explains, “There’s been such great coordination in our community, between the city and the county and the attractions and the hotels and hospitality. I can tell you that you don’t see that everywhere. We’re very fortunate that we talk to each other here and we communicate about the greater good and the greater impact. And I can tell you that hotels being open, the convention center staying open, a lot of those tourism assets has helped that industry through a very dark time.”

He continues, “We try to stay positive about it but a lot of our neighbors, a lot of our family members, have lost jobs during this pandemic. The sooner we can get the economy back to what we’re used to, the sooner all of those people can get back to work and they can lead a great quality of life here in Hillsborough County.”

With the reopening of the state of Florida, tourism is now increasing, and major events are being planned for 2021. While the iconic Gasparilla celebration has been postponed to April, Super Bowl LV will take place on February 7, 2021, at Raymond James Stadium.

Still, Santiago cautions, “You wouldn’t think that December to a February Super Bowl is a long time, but in COVID-19 days that’s a period of a long time! And so, I think things could actually change between now and February and now and April. So, we just have to be very flexible and patient. I’ve said that in the beginning, we’re going to have to practice patience because we have a situation that we don’t really control.”

The Tampa Bay Sports Commission and partners are working closely with the NFL to prepare for the big game on February 7th. With the potential for changing conditions, a final decision has not yet been made regarding the number of fans allowed in the stadium or other key details.

Santiago says, “The planning has gone on, albeit in a different fashion. We’ve had to use Zoom and technology, but now we’re starting to have more boots on the ground right here in Tampa preparing for the game. And, I think all of the preparations have gone extremely well, in light of the situation. But we’re very fortunate. I think many a city would want an event of that magnitude in their community at the beginning of 2021, where I think there’s so much hope for 2021. Most people want to see 2020 done.”

“To have that event right at the beginning of our calendar year of 2021 is a great way to open a very, very successful year,” he declares.

Even if the stands aren’t completely full, Santiago believes that the Super Bowl will have a major economic impact on the Tampa Bay region. “We will have a Super Bowl, and all eyes will be on Tampa because people will be watching it either at home or come and enjoy here in Tampa, Hillsborough County. The media exposure I’ve always said that we get from an event like that is huge and it’s priceless,” he says.

Santiago is optimistic that the exposure from the Super Bowl and the potential for repeat visitation will boost the events that follow. He also believes the news of the COVID-19 vaccine and potential treatment is encouraging for even more big events to happen in Tampa Bay.

He is proud to be the leader of Visit Tampa Bay. “It’s an incredible job and I love it because it impacts so many other things,” Santiago says.

But would you believe that tourism wasn’t his first industry? Santiago actually began his career in education! “My occupation of choice was a schoolteacher. So, I started out, believe it or not, as a teacher dealing with students with exceptional needs, and the elementary school level,” he states.

Wanting to do more, he continued his studies and worked his way to school administration. “When you’re in a classroom, you can impact, yes, 30 minds maybe every day. But if maybe you’re a principal of a school, you can affect 600 lives or 800 lives or 1200 lives. Or, if you’re a high school principal, which I became during my career in education, you can impact 3000 lives by some of the things you can do with great teachers. So, it’s been an interesting road for me,” he recalls.

Santiago’s advice is to do the right thing even when you don’t think anyone watching. He says, “Because people are always watching the way you behave and the way you carry yourself and how you treat other people. And I think that’s really been part of the key to my success, that somebody’s been watching. So, when I was a young teacher, people were watching, and they thought I could be more. And, as I was getting my education, I became an assistant principal of a middle school, I became a middle school principal, I became a high school principal, and little did I know, a mayor was watching what I was doing.”

As a young Latino principal, Santiago had cultivated a close bond with his predominantly African American and Haitian students. Impressed by what he saw, the mayor of Miami invited Santiago to join his cabinet. He explains, “The mayor had been watching the evolution of the high school and the relationship and wanted someone to come in and run the Department of Parks and Recreation for the city of Miami with that same kind of vision.”

From there, he caught the eye of another mayor, Tampa’s Pam Iorio. Santiago says, “She had just become mayor, and she was looking to do some exciting things in the city of Tampa. Real focus on neighborhoods and wanted to bring someone who had that attention to people and recruited me to come to Tampa.”

At the city of Tampa, he was exposed to many departments, and that experience led him to become Chief of Staff for the next Tampa mayor, Bob Buckhorn. And, then the opportunity at Visit Tampa Bay came along.

Santiago explains, “I’d run the convention center. I’d run point on some of the big events that the city had had, the Republican National Convention, Super Bowls, big conventions, and big events, so this was a natural flow for me.”

The work that he and the team at Visit Tampa have done has caught the attention of not only the country but the world. Santiago says, “Now the name Tampa resonates.”

He continues, “Over the last so many years, with the great things that have happened in the city and the county, and our ability to market and talk about those things has really led to where we are.”

As a not-for-profit corporation certified by Destinations International’s Destination Marketing Accreditation Program (DMAP), Visit Tampa Bay works with hundreds of partners to tell the world the story of Tampa Bay. Learn more at www.VisitTampaBay.com.

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