Interview: Paul Anderson, CEO

Deep impact

Port Tampa Bay delivers a $1.2-million-per-hour economic impact and is No. 4 in the state for cruise tourism

Paul Anderson CEO Port Tampa Bay

What is the impact of the port on the region as a growth and economic engine? We are economic developers here, with the mindset of a private company that’s developing real estate and jobs, and creating economic impact. To that end, we serve the l-4 Corridor, which is growing by about 950 people a day. We have a $1.2 million per hour economic impact in the state of Florida. A large percent of that growth is being captured in the region that we serve.

How important is the cruise industry to the region’s overall tourism market? When you look at the cruise industry, and in particular for the state of Florida, it is about 13.5 million passengers just for the state, mostly via Miami, Port Everglades, Port Canaveral, Port Tampa Bay and others. Miami, Everglades and Canaveral are No. 1, 2 and 3 in the world. We are No. 4 in the state. Our cruise portfolio is a little different because we are on the Gulf Coast, we are not as far south and it is really the Gulf Coast versus the Atlantic, where the other three ports are. The cruise lines here offer cruises with a Western Caribbean itinerary. We are also handling midtier ships, not the smallest but certainly not the biggest, because of the restriction caused by the Skyway Bridge. We don’t get the new mega cruise ships, but the previous generation of ships that have undergone expensive refurbishing. All our cruise partners, including Royal Caribbean and Carnival, have been very successful with that and ours is a nice midport for them.

In October 2020, we will add two new cruise lines, Celebrity Cruises and MSC, bringing our total to six cruise lines. Recently, we received awards from both Royal Caribbean and Carnival. They measure things like customer service experience, getting on and off a

vessel and parking. We received two of the top awards from those cruise lines.

How can Port Tampa Bay mitigate events like the Coronavirus outbreak on logistics and distribution? You always plan for the future. Resilience has become a big word in every industry, and our business has built in a lot of resilience. We have done a number of things regarding planning, and not just for global economic events or health events that could impact the economy. We are the first port certified as storm ready by NOAA, and we have a co-location site where we can run the port. But the No. 1 thing we’ve done is to continue to diversify the port’s portfolio. When you have a couple of cargos versus, in our case, seven or eight different cargos and lines of business, it gives you greater resilience.