CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) – Charleston’s tourism season begins in just a few weeks with the Southeastern Wildlife Exposition, and experts expect the season to be a busy one.
Owners of local businesses, including Blue Bicycle Books on King Street, are also optimistic about what the year will bring.
Blue Bicycle Books has evolved over the 15 years Jonathan Sanchez has owned it. With changes in Charleston come changes in customers and changes on the bookshelves.
“We used to be only used books,” he says. “This area of town has gotten a lot busier [and has gotten] a lot more visitors, some of whom maybe don’t have as much time as your typical used book browser. We do a lot more new books and fun things that people can wander in and pick it up quickly.”
Those people wandering in are often visitors to the Holy City, Sanchez says, and after meandering down King Street and dining at local restaurants, Blue Bicycle Books is the perfect spot for a break.
“Book stores are a place where people can slow down and enjoy themselves,” he says. “When you’re traveling, it’s the kind of thing that you have time for.”
Even beyond the bookstore, more and more travelers are finding plenty of time for a visit to Charleston. For several years straight, the city kept breaking its own record number of overnight visitors, according to Dr. Daniel Guttentag, the director of the office of tourism analysis at the College of Charleston.
There were 7.7 million overnight visitors in 2022 and 7.8 million in 2023, Guttentag says. Numbers are not official yet for 2024, but Guttentag expects the year to match or beat 2023’s record.
“At the same time, we’re doing a great job of attracting high-value, high-spend visitors who come for more time, and they spend significant amounts of money oftentimes,” he says.
Now that the 2025 tourism season is around the corner for Charleston, Guttentag anticipates it will be bustling.
“Really across the country right now, travel sentiment, travel intentions are very high, so that’s a reason for confidence looking into the coming year of 2025,” Guttentag says. “Here in Charleston, one exciting thing that we’re going to have this year is the opening of some new hotel properties.”
The Cooper Hotel is slated to open in the fall of 2025 on the peninsula, and there are other hotels opening up near the Charleston International Airport, including the Element by Westin and a Drury Hotel, Guttentag says.
“So that’s really exciting,” he says. “These new hotels work to attract new visitors. They also create buzz and help to attract attention from event planners and travel advisers and things like that.”
The end of 2024 saw a jump in tourism, and Guttentag hopes that enthusiasm continues.
“When we look at our 2024 numbers compared to 2023, and we compare the different months, the strongest month of the year is going to be December 2024,” he says. “We had a significant increase from 2023, so that means that we’re going into 2025 with a whole lot of momentum.”
Sanchez expects momentum to continue at Blue Bicycle Books as well.
“There used to be where we could see these ebbs and flows throughout the year, especially January which is still kind of slow, but even January isn’t that bad anymore,” he says.
No matter the month or the season, Sanchez wants to keep meeting the needs of his customers, whether tourists or locals, one book at a time.
“We love what we do, and we’ve got a great product,” Sachez says. “We love our spot. We’ve been here a really long time, and I think we’ve gotten better each year.”
The Southeastern Wildlife Expo, widely known as SEWE, is considered the start of tourism season, which will kick off Feb. 14.
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Charleston’s 2025 tourism season expected to be busy
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