#355 TIME Magazine article re: gay and lesbian travel market 1995
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. TOURISM {, t ff
Not in Kansas
Anymore
With other tourists shying away, Miami Beach woos
the nation's $17 billion gay and lesbian travel market
By TAMMERLlN DRUMMOND
MIAMI BEACH
HURRICANES, RIOTS, CRIME, AWK-
ward memories of Don Johnson
running around sockless in a pas-
tel linen jacket-deservedly or
not, the developments of the past
few years have not burnished
South Florida's image as a prime tourist
destination. And yet, even as the number of
visitors to Dade County dropped in 1994,
there was 'one conspicuous bright spot for
local boosters: gay tourists, usually with
gobs of money to spend, have been flocking
to Miami B~cl1J:>y the thousands. While
Chamber of Commerce types in other
cities might view this development with
alarm, gobs of money or no, tourism offi-
cials in Miami Beach want the world to
know all about their good fortune. "The gay
and lesbian destination of the nineties!"
crows a recently published brochure from
the South Beach Business Guild.
Not so long ago, when most gays
thought about Miami the first thing that
came to mind was Anita Bryant's .noisy
OUT SHOPPING
More examples of marketing to gays:
-T~idec recently issued a CD called
Sensual Classics, Too. The cover shows
two men embracing.
-In the spring of
1994, AT&T sent out .
a direct-mail pitch in
lavender envelopes
with a rainbow-colored
telephone cord and the
words "It's time for a
change. "
- American Express is
running ads that show
traveler's checks signed by same-sex
couples.
- An Ikea TV commercial featured a gay
male couple buying a dining table.
but successful attempt in 1977 to repeal
Dade County's gay-rights ordinance. Back
then Miami Beach itself was largely a dis-
trict of crumbling Art Deco hotels, a play-
ground for cold-weather retirees.
In the late '80s, however, the
South Beach district was discov-
ered by the ever restless fashion
industry and quickly became a
stopping-off point for photogra-
phers, models and other people
who employ the word style as
both noun and verb. Today the
area boasts not only chic stores,
restaurants and Madonna but a
thriving and increasingly visi-
ble gay population as well.
"I would now rank Miami
just behind San Francisco and
New York City [as a travel des-
tination]," says Billy Kolber, 5
editor of Out and About, a OUTn l'Jtff(N
gay-travel newsletter. Like l'JUSlntss ChILD
straights, gays are drawn by the sun and
beaches, but the comfort factor is perhaps
an even bigger draw. "People will call me
and ask if we have gay hotels," says Bob
Guilmartin, owner of the South Florida
Hotel Network, a Miami Beach reservation
service. "I tell them, 'What do you need a
gay hotel for? Everyone who works in the
hotels is already gay.'"
Eager to tap into this lucrative market-
gays are estimated to spend $17 bil-
lion a year on travel-Miami Beach
has begun aggressively courting it.
Over Memorial Day weekend, the
city treated 17 journalists from the
European gay press to an alI-
expenses-paid, four-day tour of
Dade County in hopes that the
happy junketeers would then
return home and, just like
straight travel writers, crank out
some nice puff pieces. Local businesses,
eager to come off well, donated hotel
rooms, meals and transportation. -Last week
the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors
Bureau sent invitations for a similar get-
54
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TII\IE. SFPTEI\IBEH 25.1995
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SURE BEATS ORLANDO: Gay and lesbian tourh
acquainted tour to 18 gay publications in the
U.S. "It's not an ideological or political thing
at all," says Jose Lima, a spokesman for the
organization. "It's about hard dollars."
On any given day of the week, same-
sex couples lounge on the beach at 12th
and Ocean Boulevard, across the street
'from the now refurbished and land marked
Art Deco hotels. On Lincoln Road, a
trendy pedestrian mall lined with upscale
boutiques and restaurants, young men.
stripped to the waist, stroll hand in hanc!.
A sign in a popular bar avers, YOU WANT IT,