As someone who has served on Visit Orlando’s Board, Executive Board, Finance Committee and Marketing Committee for seven years — and who has spent a lifetime in Florida tourism, including leading Visit Florida before it carried that name, I feel compelled to add context to the recent discussion surrounding Visit Orlando’s funding and accounting practices.
I respect both Sentinel columnist Scott Maxwell and Comptroller Phil Diamond. However, much of their current criticism lacks the operational and historical perspective needed to fairly evaluate how tourism marketing works and why Visit Orlando operates as it does.
Tourism is not a side industry in Orange County. It is the economic engine. Last year, 75 million visitors came to this community. The majority of the Tourist Development Tax (TDT) dollars used to fund Visit Orlando do not come from local taxpayers, they come from visitors. Those funds are specifically intended to drive more visitation, which in turn fuels our hotels, restaurants, attractions, retail, transportation and thousands of jobs across our region.
A $100 million marketing budget for the No. 1 tourism destination in the world is not excessive — it is strategic and necessary. Competing destinations around the globe are spending heavily to attract the same visitors. If we stop marketing, visitation drops. If visitation drops, our economy feels it immediately.
There has also been attention placed on items such as a CEO car allowance and a marketing function in New York City. In the private hospitality sector, where I spent my career, a car allowance is standard for executive leadership. Every CEO of Visit Orlando has had one. This is not new, unusual, or out of line with industry norms.
Likewise, hosting events in key feeder markets like New York is not a luxury — it is core to tourism marketing. Relationships with media, travel partners and industry stakeholders in major markets directly translate into visitation and economic impact here at home. That is the return on investment.
Cassandra Matej has been the most transparent CEO in Visit Orlando’s history. I had the privilege of working with all of her predecessors, and each was deeply mindful that they were stewarding public funds. That culture has not changed.
It is healthy to ask questions about accountability. But it is equally important that we do not lose sight of results. Visit Orlando is not a cost to this community — it is one of its greatest economic drivers.
We should be thanking this organization for what it does for our economy, not politicizing the very marketing efforts that keep it strong.
Ed Gilbert is a former Florida tourism director and CEO of Absolute Thinking.