Tourist tax collections in the month that brought Thanksgiving registered a 36.7% increase in November 2025 from November 2024.
The revenue bump shouldn’t be surprising. In November 2024, the area was in an early recovery from a trio of storms — Debby, Helene and Milton. Also, the tourist development tax went from 5% to 6% in 2025.
The tax is collected on overnight accommodations of six months or less, including hotels, motels and vacation rentals.
The Manatee County Tax Collector’s office released November 2025 data in early January, as the tax is turned into the government office in the month after it’s collected.
The second month of the 2025-26 fiscal year — which brings visitors taking a Thanksgiving holiday on the beaches — showed $1,827,472 collected. In 2024-25, the same month’s collections totaled $1,336,881.
Holmes Beach topped collections on AMI, generating $378,406, about 20.7% of the total.
Anna Maria accounted for about 12.59% of the collections, bringing in $230,085, and Bradenton Beach generated $59,214 or 3.24%.
Some other numbers for November:
- Unincorporated Manatee County generated $776,975 or 42.52%.
- Bradenton generated $192,766 or 10.55%;
- Longboat Key generated $130,407 or 7.14%;
- Palmetto generated $59,678 or 3.27%.
The collection fee or commission on the tax is 3%, so the net collection for the Manatee County Tourist Development Council in November was $1,772,647.
The tax dollars are not collected by the municipalities and do not go directly to the locales where tourists visited. The county tourist development council recommends how to spend the resort tax revenues to the county commission.
Under state law, the tax dollars must be used to boost and develop tourism, including tourism marketing and funding for the Bradenton Area Convention and Visitors Bureau and the Bradenton Area Convention Center and tourism-related entities such as Realize Bradenton and the Pittsburgh Pirates, as well as supporting projects, such as island beach renourishment and construction of the new Anna Maria City Pier.
The December 2025 numbers will be released in early February.
November tourist tax collections
November 2021: $1,432,990
November 2022: $1,798,479
November 2023: $1,624,562
November 2024: $1,336,881
November 2025: $1,827,472
Source: Manatee County Tax Collector