A day after Hurricane Ian battered Fort Myers Beach, Ben Bronsord surveyed the scene of his destroyed, flagship retail store, Tunaskin Aquatic Apparel, which had completely filled with water from storm surge. He then immediately began planning its comeback.
Bronsord finally marked the store’s comeback as complete, as it reopened at 1400 Estero Blvd. on Fort Myers Beach.
Bronsord established Tunaskin, a Bonita Springs-based beach apparel brand, as an online retail outlet in 2010 before opening its first brick-and-mortar location just north of Lani Kai Island Resort. After years of selling the products from portable kiosks and a trailer, Bronsord returned to those roots when the hurricane destroyed his first store more than 14 months ago.
“We had to rebuild the whole building,” Bronsord said. He didn’t reveal specifics of the cost, but he said it was hundreds of thousands of dollars and insurance, including extensive flood and wind policies, covered about 75% of the costs.
His experience subcontracting the building of his own home at the southern end of the island familiarized him with the ins and outs of Fort Myers Beach government’s permitting process. “We jumped on it right after the storm,” he said. “It was pretty much day-in and day-out. It took 14 months.”
Tunaskin reopened Nov. 19. Although Lani Kai remains closed while being renovated, Margaritaville Resort to the north just opened its 254-room hotel. Tunaskin employees said they hoped the new hotel drives traffic to their store.
“There aren’t a lot of hotels open,” said Ben Duval, Tunaskin’s events director. “There aren’t a lot of restaurants open. But the hope is we’re the first of many [stores open], kind of lighting that spark that gets everybody going in the community.”
In being one of the few retail stores open on the beach, Duval and Bronsord hope to bring their brand to an even higher level of awareness.
The Fort Myers Beach store in 2015 led to opening one in Key West (2017), Sarasota (2019) and Bonita Springs (2020).
Attached and above the Fort Myers Beach store are six condominiums. The rebuilding of Tunaskin made for a new look, with the condos mostly hidden behind the new sign.
“We revamped the outside and the signs,” Duval said. “Not to have a Tunaskin store inside a building, but to create a Tunaskin building.”
The storm’s destruction also prompted the company to completely redesign the inside as well.
“We were finally able to design the store the way we wanted,” Duval said. “It was a full overhaul of the building. It was a team effort.”
Tunaskin shirts start at about $34.
Duval said he was thrilled with the end result.
“It is technically the same size, but we were able to build it out to exactly what we wanted or what we needed,” Duval said. “This was our first flagship store eight years ago. This was kind of the bread and butter of everything. We’ve got four stores all over the west coast of Florida, but this is the hometown store. This is where we got the support from the community.”
