With summer in full swing, tourists from away are flocking to Maine’s coast for the sun and the sights from Acadia National Park to Old Orchard Beach. Last year, 32.9 million tourists visited Maine, with about 4.2 million coming from Maine’s northern neighbor: Canada.
At the Red Apple Campground in Kennebunkport, business is getting into full swing as Canadians scoop up campsites to secure access to southern Maine beaches so popular with visitors from the north.
“The closer you are to the water, the bigger the percentage [of Canadian customers] you get,” owner Dave Berg said.
Although Berg reports no slowdown in the number of Canadians staying at his campground, hoteliers and tourism officials are concerned that as the Canadian dollar, also known as the loonie, falls in value against its U.S. counterpart, fewer Canadians will visit Maine.
In 2014, the 4.2 million Canadians visiting Maine represented a sharp decrease from more than 5.5 million the year before, a 23 percent decline. Already some hotel owners are saying they’re having trouble filling rooms vacated by Canadian customers canceling reservations out of concern about the steadily slipping loonie and Canadian economy, the Portland Press Herald reported Sunday.
The Canadian economy got off to a sluggish start this year, with Statistics Canada reporting June 30 that the national gross domestic product contracted between January and April, spurring talk of recession. As a result, the loonie has slipped to 73 percent of the value of the dollar as of July 14, the lowest it’s sunk since it hit 71 percent of the value of the dollar Dec. 5, 2008.
While the first three months of the year are among the least popular for tourists from Canada, border crossings and flights from the country into Maine were down about 9 percent this year compared with the same period last year.
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With early reports from hoteliers that fewer Canadians are making the trip south, there’s concern the unfavorable exchange rate will cause tourism to decline further from last year.
A good camping season?
Many coastal campground operators, however, say they aren’t feeling the pinch, suggesting a contraction in Canadian tourism won’t be felt evenly across Maine’s tourism industry. In fact, they report this summer may be better than the last.
“Reservations are up, and it looks to be a great camping season,” Kathy Dyer, executive director of the Maine Campground Owners Association, said.
At Red Apple, Berg reports that not only has traffic been comparable to last year, but Canadians are booking further in advance. And it’s not just tent sites they’re booking but the more costly RV rental units, he said.
At Hid’n Pines Campground in Old Orchard Beach, the summer traffic has been steady with a 1 percent to 2 percent increase so far, officer manager Megan Poirier said, adding that about 60 percent of the campground’s customers are Canadian.
Campground owners said the strong Canadian traffic is likely because of proactive marketing by the Maine Campground Owners Association, which earlier this year handed out more than 10,000 guides at RV and camping shows in Quebec City, Montreal and Moncton, New Brunswick.
Poirier said Hid’n Pines has offered specials for Canadian customers to offset weakness in the loonie and keep traffic coming south.
But whether the frosty economic conditions to the north would change Canadian plans for a Maine vacation “remains to be seen,” Poirier said.
Uncertain forecast
According to Carolann Ouellette, director of the Maine Office of Tourism, 2013 was an unusual year. Between 2008 and 2012, the number of Canadian tourists held steady until a surge in 2013, when it jumped 24 percent to 5.5 million. This also included a 16 percent increase in first visits from the north.
The number of Canadians crossing the border by bus or car declined to about 4.5 million last year, down from 5 million passengers in 2010, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data. That represents the vast majority of visitor traffic from Canada into the state, with few flights from the country into Maine airports.
Officials at the Presque Isle airport reported last month that an increasing number of New Brunswick residents are driving over the border to leave from their airstrip.
Based on her conversations with lodging operators, Ouellette expects Canadian tourism this summer will be similar to last year.
Across the border some travel industry officials say the weak loonie is not as big a deterrent for Canadians’ vacation plans. Manny Witt, director of the Canada-based New England Tourism Center, said New England is one of the top destinations for Canadians, especially Maine.
“It’s the ocean — it’s a big draw,” he said.
The U.S. Office of Travel and Tourism Industries has forecasted tourism to the U.S. will increase by 3 percent this year, including 23.4 million Canadians, a 1 percent increase from 2014.
Allison Wallace, director of Media and Communications for Flight Centre Travel Group, said flights from Canada to the U.S. are up 10 percent compared to last year. While the travel agency doesn’t sell a lot of tickets to Maine, she said flights to Maine are up 13 percent from last year.
“So we’re not seeing any adverse effect of the declining loonie at this time,” she wrote by email. But Canadians booking trips through Flight Centre have been taking shorter trips than years before, when the loonie and dollar were closer to parity.
“If the loonie continues to decline, I suspect we’ll start to see a decline. But we’re right in the middle of a peak season travel period, so we likely won’t see any significant changes until after [the] summer,” Wallace wrote.
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Cheap gas, low taxes
Despite the unfavorable exchange rate, factors such as low U.S. gas prices and high Canadian taxes may keep Maine as a sought-after destination for Canadian tourists.
According to GasBuddy.com, the average price for a gallon of gas in Canada is around $4.50, while across the border in Maine that price is nearly half that, around $2.70.
“They have a choice: Are they going to go to Toronto or the Maine coast?” Witt said. “Once they go across the border and fill their gas tank, they’ll see the savings.”
Witt said a low sales tax — 5.5 percent — will make Maine more favorable for Canadians as a vacation destination than those at home. According to Canada Revenue Agency, the sales tax in provinces neighboring Maine is as high as 13 percent. The sales tax in Quebec is 14.9 percent, according to Revenu Quebec.
Even with a weaker loonie, Witt said it is cheaper to travel across the U.S. than Canada, but it’s too early know how Maine’s traditionally advantageous relationship with Canadian visitors would fare under the current economic conditions.
“This is only the beginning of the season,” he said.