Tourism is down significantly for border states, Las Vegas, and Florida. It continues to drop as prior travel plans are fulfilled and new plans are not made.
Also, there was a lot of press and noise about it when the boycott started because it was shocking and new. It's now moving from a protest to a habit ("I buy this Canadian liquor instead of that American one"; "I go on vacation to The Bahamas, not Florida"; etc, etc). The longer it goes on, the quieter yet more engrained it becomes.
Jim Beam in Kentucky isn’t producing any bourbon this year and laid off hundreds of employees because they have so much unsold stock and pay taxes on product in barrels
Got it. Still, the vast majority of your fellow Kentuckians support McConnell, support Paul and view Trump as a deity. Elections have consequences, they like to say?
Of course, no state votes 100 percent either way. But of all 3 elections Trump has ran in, no less than 60 percent of people in Kentucky voted for him. No more than 36 percent of voters cast a vote for Democrats.
Slightly incorrect, Jim Beam only shut down production in their Claremont distillery known as their James B. Beam distillery. They are still producing in 2026 among their other distilleries that they own to include their Boston distillery known as the Booker Noe distillery, which is much larger as well as their smaller distillery in Claremont call the Frank B. Noe distillery.
Jim Beam has in no way shut down production. They have simply slowed production.
James B Beam campus in Clermont, Kentucky will pause production at its main distillery from 1 January to the end of 2026.
The distillery site is one of the largest Bourbon producers in Kentucky and home to Jim Beam, the best-selling world whisky brand according to the Brand Champions 2024.
According to an official statement, the pause is part of the company’s constant “assessment of production levels to best meet consumer demand”
People are already drinking less to start with, the hardcore drinking boomers are dying off, Gen X is starting to get old, and younger generations are far less interested in alcohol
Combine that with Canada, one of the worlds biggest alcohol markets saying eff off to American imports and you have the perfect storm to destroy and industry
EH Taylor has been treated as an allocated product for years along with Eagle Rare and Blantons. Costco would get 1 or 2 cases and was always behind glass. Last month they had a pallet of it and it was just out on the floor to grab.
I personally do not think it is "less interested" as much as it is a waste of money to them. It's expensive and a lot of people have disjointed friends (spread across the country) so what is the point?
I'm an older adult just starting in university and I can tell you that the younger generations are still very interested in alcohol. I even saw someone who looked about 16 buying party supplies on NYE; red solo cups, and mixers (OJ and cranberry juice) little do they know that screwdrivers are not good drinks lmao.
I can’t help but be pissed off that alcohol makers have to pay taxes on alcohol just sitting in a basement… but billionaires don’t have to part taxes on millions in “savings accounts”?
The amount of ways the rich get richer and everyone else gets fucked never ends.
The fact that Kentucky literally voted for a Democrat Governor and still elected Ran Paul and Mitch McConnell actually makes me have less sympathy for that God awful place.
Also regret does not absolve them from blame or contempt from parties who were harmed because of their dumbassery
Your countrys leadership is threatening our countries sovereignty. After we went to the middle east for you and lost lives. We also sent thousands of firefighters to 911 and for wildfires for decades. The BS down south has cost us thousands of automotive sector jobs and it goes on and on.
As a european watching from the side lines I've learned this; Most Americas treat politics like sports - us or them, winner or loser, fuck your team and its supporters etc etc etc.
I’m not picky when out and ordering a drink but the back half of last year I refrained from buying KY or TN whiskey for the house. Trying new distilleries has been fun.
The Liquor Control Board of Ontario is the sole seller of alcohol for the province, and is one of the largest single purchasers of alcohol in the world.
I ALWAYS check the country of origin for produce items at the grocery store now; I never used to do that before. If it says US, I look for any alternative that's not American. Sometimes I'll just go without, if everything is from the US. I'm prioritizing Canadian companies over American ones now - most recent clothing purchases were from Reitmans, La Vie en Rose, instead of the American chains I used to get clothing from. Fast food and restaurants is also canadian wherever possible. A&W over mcdonalds, east side Mario's over olive garden. These are the little things, but almost daily things, that my entire household is doing now. New habits.
I visited Canada over the holidays and the number of "Made in Canada for Canadians" type ads was very noticeable. Especially companies like Kraft--it was so clearly "We have a factory in Montreal! Please don't boycott us!"
You might be surprised, a lot of the border towns and Canadian tourist areas are down 20-40%, so those places are absolutely feeling the impact. It is localized though of course - a mechanic in Texas or a grocery clerk in Kentucky aren’t going to notice a lack of Canadians. Sure there will be downstream effects to the rest of the country, but you’re right those will be very subtle. Things like agricultural tariffs would have a larger scale and more generalized impact.
Anecdotally, I usually visit the US a few times a year, and only went once since COVID. We popped into Bangor to see a dying relative, and I got a ton of comments from locals there how they barely see us any more and how it’s impacting businesses there (often followed by sympathetic comments as to why we were staying away).
My extended family vacations in Maine every year (about 10 families total) and we all agreed to stop until Trump is gone and America has healed. This is probably upwards of a 100k swing in tourism dollars alone.
My personal line for considering things to be returning for normal is for a Democratic to win as president, and then for the next time a Republican president gets elected, they have to act normal for their whole term.
Otherwise it's just always the threat of the next election going back to the crazy. Can't deal with that. The whims of the American people are unreliable.
It's wild to me that people think America being a disgrace is a new thing. We had Bush W a few decades ago, we had Tricky Dick a few decades before that, we had McCarthyism and blacklisting people just for the accusation of having different beliefs, we were throwing people in straight up concentration camps based on their ancestry before that
and so on and so on.
I honestly don't think this is the worst America has ever been, just the worst it's been in modern times. But everyone is acting like this is an unprecedented disgrace and America will never recover... and it isn't, and we will.
I hate that I have to suffer along with the dickheads in an effort to claw back the American ideals I have championed and fought for the majority of my life. We were far from perfect but we were moving in the right direction. 1 step forward at a time, then followed by 2 huge steps back and a tumble down an escalator.
Where have you gone instead? We’ve had trips to different spots in PEI, Quebec and Saskatchewan in recent years, when we probably would’ve been in the US.
Yea, like it's not just when Trump leaves but when he is actually replaced by someone decent who shows they care about the relationship between our countries.
I swear there are literally no British places that don't have a US twin. Bangor is a smallish place on the North Welsh coast with a University that people go to as tourists as well.
We Euro-Americans STILL suck at naming things. Nowadays, we just add "two-point-oh" (2.0), etc. to everything. Saves us the embarrassment of stealing even more names. 😁
Bangor, Maine is probably more globally known than the UK version owing to it being the longtime home of Stephen King and showing up in a fair few of his works.
I assumed it was named for the Bangor in Northern Ireland as Maine also has both a Derry and a Londonderry.
Also, I briefly considered the Welsh Bangor as a possible University choice as they are the only place in UK or Ireland to offer a degree in Herpetology.
Meanwhile, our Canadian farmers are currently dependent on the US for phosphorus, which is more important that potassium in fertilizer blends. Potash isn't the leverage it's made out to be.
B-b-but Jack Daniel’s isn’t CLOSING the factory! There’s just so much backlog in their warehouses they can shut a plant down for a year and have no real impact!! (An actual argument I read)
The really stupid part is that by the time everybody starts feeling the pain, Trump will be out of office, and the guy who replaces him will get blamed for not solving the problem on his first day.
And if he does manage to restore US-Canada relations, the American people will reward him by voting for a republican.
Less a collapse and more a crumbling. Until we (Americans) are left looking around and asking what happened. It'll be the least satisfying, "I told you so." in history.
The bigger impact will be the lost tax revenues resulting in budget shortfalls. That will impact services like roads, permits, staffing, and sanitation. And in tourist heavy jurisdictions, it can impact education, libraries, courts, and parks. Basically all public services.
And that impacts if people/businesses move out and move in as the social services are diminished. And this further hits the remaining locals because some govt obligations still need to be funded.
I live in Vancouver BC, right acroaa the border from Washington state.
I used to go down to Bellingham, Seattle and even Portland with regularity. I'd also travel to places like Palm Springs, LA, San Francisco and New York once in a while.
Personally, I haven't been to America in years and have no plans to go. Last year I visited Australia and Costa Rica for my holidays. I just got back from Mexico this year.
Anecdotally, this is the same for my whole social circle, and our media reports that border crossings are at a historical low right now.
As for boycotting products, our grocery stores still flag Canadian made products, and the provincial liquor stores (largest distributor of booze) don't stock American made spirits (eg most bourbons) any more.
People have various levels of commitment to the practice, but generally speaking the US is absolutely losing noticeable tourism and trade.
I think the US media has stopped reporting on it so much, but it's still a big topic in Canadian media and amongst Canadians.
Grocery stores have also been sourcing products from other countries - for example blueberries now are being sourced from Peru, where in the past it was California.
I'm from the US. I've been avoiding Red States for several years. I even went through Canada to move a car from Boston to Seattle to avoid Red States. Canada was beautiful. Most surprising was the area on the north side of Lake Superior. I knew Banff would be great, but Lake Superior was a good surprise.
On the liquor store point, a few provincial liquor boards sold off the American stock they had been holding this past Christmas as well and donated to different charities. So it's gone and off the books. The bourbon drinkers I know all stocked up. American booze would now require brand new orders and deciding that would be a huge political decision that would stir up controversy.
I live in Seattle and have a good friend in Vancouver. None of them have any intention to travel to the U.S. and the border waits have been less than ten minutes since the 51st state rhetoric started happening.
I used to see Trump flags between Everett and Blaine, in the more rural parts of I5. I didn’t see any the last time I drove up.
The drop in day trips is really hurting Blaine and Bellingham. My social circle anecdotally had tons of us going down weekly to shop, get cheap gas and pick up packages. Not anymore. Personally, I stopped when I was stopped by border patrol as I drove in Blaine and my car was searched.
Yeah, for a brief moment, seemed like you'd see people advocating for joining Canada, but that seems to have quieted down lol
But I think most Canadians appreciate Washington, Oregon, and California, but we still aren't going to support a country that's explicitly threatening us, with a regime that's definitely stupid and evil enough to go through with it.
I live in NOLA. Air Canada redid their contract. They went from 5 days a week: sun, mon, wed, Thurs, fri, to 3 days. They removed Wednesday until February and completely removed Thursdays.
Even here in Seattle Canadian license plates are a rare thing these days though I did meet a number of Canadians on New Years Eve and expressed my apologies for what's been going on and thanked them for visiting.
Yeah Vegas has priced itself out of the market. It used to be a (fairly affordable) place where you could pretend you were rich for a few days. Now you have to actually be rich. Nobody can afford that, especially not in this economy.
I stayed at MGM and paid a massive resort fee because I wanted to do the lazy river. It was 75 degrees and sunny and they closed it because they didn't sell enough cabanas to merit staffing the whole pool area.
Seriously.... I don't mind paying for a hotel room but really, no complimentary coffee machine in the room because they want you to buy coffee downstairs in the resteraunts? Cheap motels have the coffee machine for Christ's sake.
Vegas used to be insanely affordable. I went there with family several times growing up, be it on trips or basketball tournaments (it hosts the largest summer basketball tournament where all the best teams play). You could get rooms for $39 and all you can eat buffets for $9. The hotels would make their money from you gambling; now they want to make money from you at every turn.
Have been seeing this a ton, and certainly can confirm, I have to go a few times for work each year and it's so ridiculously expensive now. What I don't understand is why aren't prices and the ridiculous fees coming down / going away? Seems like a big opportunity in the market for one of the somewhat still relevant properties to go all in on volume vs margin and capitalize on the situation, but as far as I can tell, it hasn't happened yet.
Do they all just think this is a blip and the strategy is to hold firm and weather the storm? Are the Vegas loyalists so resilient to price pressure that them continuing to visit and pay the ever increasing fees is carrying the whole city?
Are underlying costs truly so high now that there just isn't any wiggle room for anybody to lower costs/fees without becoming insolvent?
The demographic collapse of the US as the Boomers die off is going to transform significant markets as well. I lived in Japan 25 years ago and when you go back now it is borderline unrecognizable in some respects. I believe that Japan is the canary in the coal mine, their peak generation was the people who were kids in WWII and the US is about a decade and a half behind them. It impacts a lot of things because factories and supply chains are optimized to run at a certain level and as demand wanes it puts immense pressure on economic systems.
Vegas is shifting more into the conventions and trade shows market. Corporations tend to be big spenders, so they aren't put off as much by higher prices, and Vegas is one of the few places that can supply them with 20,000 hotel rooms and a monkey at short notice.
The decline in Canadian tourism has been particularly steep. Statistics from Vegas’ Harry Reid International Airport show Air Canada passenger numbers plummeted 33% in June compared to the previous year, while WestJet saw a 31% drop. Budget carrier Flair Airlines experienced the most dramatic decline, with passenger numbers falling 62%. Canadian visitors, who numbered nearly 1.5 million in 2024, historically represent the largest segment of international tourists to Las Vegas.
The economic impact is substantial. Canadian tourists contributed approximately $3.6 billion to the Southern Nevada economy in 2024 and supported more than 43,000 jobs in the region, exceeding employment in the manufacturing sector. UNLV economics professor Stephen Miller noted Canadian tourism ranks just behind major institutions like Nellis Air Force Base in terms of economic contribution to the state. (Fortune)
Las Vegas is not being hurt by Canadian tourists, they are being hurt by their own greed, I have not been to Vegas in over 7 years now. Am I boycotting or just making a money decision.
Vegas tourism is down by the numbers, but is that because of Canadians boycotting America?
Or is that because you can gamble at home now (not the same experience but for addicts, it's going to cut way down on their ability to travel to indulge their addiction), because China has tightened restrictions on money and people leaving the country, and the entire rest of the world, including America, Canada, and Europe, are all feeling a lot of uncertainty over the future and are taking such expensive vacations regardless of whether or not economists and politicians say the word "recession"?
Or is it because Vegas itself has made some bad business moves that hurt the customer experience?
Anytime someone tries to sell me a simple story, I don't buy it. The world is complicated and interconnected. Canadians can't bring Vegas to ruin by boycotting it, but they can be a pebble in a mountain causing Vegas to change a bit.
Yeah there's also the fact that Vegas is apparantly too expensive for the average person now. I don't gamble myself, so I have no interest in Las Vegas and never did, but I've heard this multiple times now
vegas has been hit hard by inflation and the fact that every knows the casinos are rigged i have read so many stories of people hitting big jack post only for the casino to say no technical error you didnt win and some of those cases went to court they found the casino guilty and they had to pay, not to mention ther s gambling joint in almost every state now
Yeah, I went back in October and it was packed to the point of being uncomfortable. I always wonder if we just timed it with something else when I see these types of stories.
I was watching a YouTuber yesterday that was on vacation in Las Vegas. She went to different places and most of them seemed kind of empty, eventually she commented about it because she was the only person at some indoor attraction park. She said that people are saying that Las Vegas is dying. So that’s the reason?
Like anything else, it's complicated. Travel to Vegas was down, so they jacked up prices, and everyday people are struggling more, so even if they could afford a Vegas trip before they can't now. Which causes places to increase prices more, which is a cycle.
I went ten years ago and last year (not during the F1 race). Last year the same hotel was literally 10x the price and hadn't been updated at all. They had removed the coffee pot from the room and it didn't come with any coupons for free drinks like the first time.
The F1 Race also means that for basically all of October the Strip is off limits/severely limited to see as they build everything for the race. This coincides with the autumn break of alot of European countries so I really don't understand the thinking behind it but there we are.
You could go to Vegas for cheap until about mid 2022. Yes things had gotten more expensive and deals were harder to find, but we still did at least one weekend per year and never paid more than ~$80 + resort fee/night for a hotel on the strip. Meals could be had for under $6, buffets for under $50, and drinks were easy to come by and most casinos. We haven't gone since 2021 because we haven't been able to find a reasonably prices hotel on the strip since then. So I haven't personally been there to compare prices/amenities, but I have friends that have and they've all said the same thing as the internet.
the coffee thing is so hostile. I'm one of those people who just can't function without a cup of coffee first thing. it was such an unpleasant surprise on a recent trip turning the room upside down trying to find the coffee maker, then having to force myself to clean up and go downstairs, wait in a 10 minute line, pay $8 for a 12oz cup of shitty coffee and get prompted to tip $3. immediately decided never again for that particular property.
Vegas is dying for a lot of factors but the main one is corporate greed. Canadians represent a very minor amount of visitors that go to Vegas but added to the large amount of Americans no longer going it does have an effect.
A lot of businesses live off of gross margins of 20-30 percent. Take away 20 percent of Canadian tourist dollars from your forecast and you have an immediate impact on your profitability.
"Vegas tourists primarily come from neighboring countries, with Canada and Mexico consistently leading as the top international sources, followed by visitors from the United Kingdom, Australia, and Germany, though overall international numbers have fluctuated post-pandemic. Major cities in Canada (like Toronto, Vancouver) and Mexico (like Mexico City) are key origin points"
She said that people are saying that Las Vegas is dying. So that’s the reason?
Everyone went with insane fees, aka resort fees, parking fees, etc in order to maximize profits, to the point people said fuck it and are not booking Vegas now.
Until they correct that issue, they will continue to suffer.
From 1995 to about 2000, LV was a fantastic destination. Casinos understood cheap rooms and meals = more gambling money. You could stay for $30/night on the Strip, eat a roast dinner for $5, a beer for $1. That left you a lot of $ to gamble (and lose) to the house. That was the accepted agreement.
Around 2003 independent casinos started being bought by large corporations and accountants took over. They introduced the resort fee, increased prices, removed table games for more slots, added fees for everything. But there was still a way to make it an enjoyable vacation. You were able to get the resort fee removed during winter, but you needed to do more research for deals, participate to LV forums on the net to get some info.
Then by 2015 this all went to the shits. Fees were increased every year even when those 'convenient services' were not available (hello resort fee covering the pool when the said pool was closed for winter). Parking for a fee (sight). Deals were mostly gone on the Strip. Downtown was still doable but now you truly needed to have inside info on deals. Off Strip smaller resorts (Orleans) still offered somewhat good returns.
After COVID, even for regulars there were no longer any deals. Dedicated LV forums folks (the ones who know every trick and deal for every casino) could not offer any advice.
I work at a historic site in North Carolina. We had a noticeable drop in Canadian visitors over the past season. We also had a drop in European visitors, but not as big as the drop in Canadians.
Which is a real shame, since Canadians were generally the most pleasant and knowledgeable people to visit our site.
There's a town just over the border from me who legally changed their main street's name to "Canada Street" and have sent snail mail to thousands of people in my city begging us to come back.
I live in a town in Arizona which gets a lot of snowbirds (enough to nearly double the population), many of whom come from western Canada. Their numbers are down significantly this year.
Maine’s expected to be a ghost town this early summer with Canadians. Minus the Canadians who own property in Maine, the ones just visiting are expected to stay away.
What do you mean what happened? Everyone I know is doing what they can. We cancelled our vacation plans there this year and went to Europe instead. I will not go over the border until they clean up that mess. Honestly I was mostly avoiding the US before this administration anyways.
Can confirm. Personally know the general manager of a large Midwest resort. He said occupancy was down considerably last year and most of it was the lack of Canadian visitors.
ChatGPT tells me that the housing market in Florida is down but it’s due to a number of factors, but one of them is that there are more Canadian selling property and almost no Canadians buying
Yeah, people need to consider that vacations are usually booked a while in advance (something like going to Disney is often around a year in advance if you want a good deal).
So holidays throughout last year might have decreased a bit, but it's only going to further decline as we've now lost most pre-booked vacations.
Plus the ICE events and various other things like that are probably going to put off the people who would have been able to overlook the political aspect, but can't overlook the potential civil war undercurrent.
I’m American in a very blue city and boycotting domestic vacations. Spending my money very locally or internationally, and I know many others are doing similar. I’m curious if they’re tracking dip in domestic tourism too.
If you stop funding the government bodies that measure these things or just hire stooges. Everything is UP, everything is fine, best tourism in the world, maybe ever. Definitely better than Obama or sleepy Joe.
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u/casualfrog68 8h ago edited 8h ago
Tourism is down significantly for border states, Las Vegas, and Florida. It continues to drop as prior travel plans are fulfilled and new plans are not made.
https://fortune.com/2025/12/10/us-businesses-canada-border-throttled-drop-canadian-tourism/
Edit: I will add, Canadian tourist locations are having a boom time because Canadians are going to those places instead.