OCEAN CITY, Md.- Some Ocean City businesses say crowds were smaller this Memorial Day weekend, meaning profits were lower than expected. Cortney Bullock from Cabanas Beach Bar and Grille says inflation and high gas prices are likely to blame.
"You could definitely see that there was a huge decline in foot traffic on the boardwalk and the road traffic coming into town," said Bullock. "Our bets guess is honestly probably fuel prices and the way the economy is right now you know with the inflation of everything um you know your normal families are paying a lot more at the grocery store and everything else"
"I can definitely say that the crowds weren't as heavy this year as years past unfortunately um we definitely had some good crowds in season but the traffic was not there we always waited hours in traffic to get into work and this year I didn't have to do that," said McNaney. "There are not as many people so so people aren't going to be spending the money unfortunately, um but what I can say we still did good but probably not as good as we could have done when there were more people here in years past"
Shannon Tippet from Mug and Mallet says business was good though looking out, the crowds seemed smaller.
"I just think people didn't drive once they got here I think they parked and walked everywhere," said Tippet.
WBOC spoke with Susan Jones at OC Hotel Motel Association, who said lots of hotels were booked while others had vacancies and restaurants were packed but traffic was still a bit low. The Tourism Metric Report is expected to be release by the third week of June, which details statistics of lodging, transportation and sales for this past Memorial Day weekend.