How did Hurricane Ian affect businesses in Southwest Florida?

FGCU’s Regional Economic Research Institute set out to find an answer by combing through Florida Department of Revenue taxable sales data for the five-county area. The institute’s report compared data from October 2022 (the first full month after the storm made landfall) to October 2021. Overall, taxable sales increased 16%, largely caused by the massive recovery effort. Car dealerships and other automotive businesses drove much of the increase. Seeing the steepest decline was the hotel industry, which fell almost 30%.