Cin the city say economic pressures are holding the industry back from fully flourishing.
Kathy Motton, senior communications manager at Destination Toronto, told CTV News Toronto that the tourism industry has almost fully recovered since the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020.
“We’re not fully recovered. We are at 93 per cent of where we were pre-pandemic. We are getting closer but we are not quite there yet,” she said. “Economic uncertainty has sort of slowed down the recovery.”one
Jusep Sim, the co-founder of CEO of Chopsticks+Forks, a food tour company in Toronto, told CTV News Toronto, that his business bounced back surprisingly fast after the pandemic ended in 2022, but this summer things changed.
“This summer is actually slower than last summer for me specifically. I straddle a couple of industries because I operate walking food tours and so my challenge is the food costs and inflation since COVID,” he said.
“My tours have gone up in price quite significantly since COVID because all the restaurants are raising prices. I raised my ticket prices by over 30 per cent.”
Sim said he’s also noticing that people are expecting a lot more for their dollar, and that customers are adjusting to “see the value in what they spend and what they get.”
Chris Doerwald, Toronto operations manager for Tripshepherd, told CTV News Toronto that their tour company has done very well since the pandemic ended, but recently they have had to adjust some of their tours to provide cheaper options amid the economic situation.
