Playa del Carmen Merchants Report Sales Down to 20% Amid Tourism Crisis

Playa del Carmen, Quintana Roo — Merchants in Playa del Carmen say the tourism slump has pushed them to the brink, with sales running at just 20 to 25 percent of normal levels and ticking up only around payday.

Gerardo González, a vendor on Avenida Juárez with two decades in the city, said he has never seen a season this bad, not even during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Worse Than the Pandemic

“In all the years I’ve been here, we’ve never had a season as sad as this one,” he said.

González criticized what he called poor government planning and questioned spending on tourism promotion programs that, he said, have yet to produce any visible benefits for local businesses.

No Results From Tourism Promotions

Among his concerns: the lack of preparation for sargassum seaweed arrivals, weak tourism marketing strategies, and campaigns such as “Let’s Playa,” which he said has had no measurable impact.

“They promoted something called Let’s Playa,” he said. “Honestly, I don’t know what it was for. To this day, we’ve seen absolutely no results from it.”

Failure to Plan for Downturns

González argued the problem can’t be blamed solely on international factors like U.S. tariffs. Authorities, he said, should have anticipated adverse economic scenarios and built mechanisms to protect tourism.

He warned that Playa del Carmen is close to replicating the situation now seen in Tulum, where hotel occupancy has fallen to historic lows.

“We’re not far from the chaotic situation in Tulum,” he said. “We’re almost the same here.”

Spending Collapses

The downturn is rippling through the local economy, he said. His business depends mainly on tourism workers, and with fewer hires and less hotel activity, consumer spending has dried up.

“If there’s no tourism, there’s no movement. If there’s no movement in hotels, there are no sales anywhere,” he said.

Sales at 25 Percent

González said his sales are currently between 20 and 25 percent of what he normally expects. They climb to roughly 50 percent on payday, but drop the next day.

He urged authorities to change course and put together a genuine tourism promotion strategy, arguing that merchants can’t rely on official campaigns that, in his view, have delivered nothing.

“I hope the government opens its eyes and realizes the mistake it made,” he said. “I hope it corrects course, if it can.”