Speaker numbers apply only to this recording.
On Monday, October 12, 2026, at 1:30 PM, the Clearwater City Council met in a work session in Council Chambers at the Main Library, 100 N. Osceola Avenue, Clearwater, FL. The council received the BayCare Sound quarterly update, acted on a large consent agenda, considered two third-reading planning ordinances, heard competing proposals for the city-owned property at 1875 Airport Drive, and discussed the annual evaluations of the City Manager and City Attorney. Meeting minutes were not available; this summary is based on the agenda and raw transcript.
Hi. Again, Megan Brennan, VP of Marketing. I'm here to report the quarterly update for the Bay Care Sound for October. Perfect. Since our last visit, we celebrated the third anniversary of the Bay Care Sound, which is hard to believe. The sound looked awesome on TV. I don't know if you guys got to see it, but it was pretty amazing. We installed the sun shade, the much anticipated sun shade, and it has been working. We use it in different shows depending on what the weather is like, but it has been really nice to have. Some upgraded electrical that you're aware of. And then you saw that on the screen the best rankings to date, and I will get to that in my um later in the presentation. So far, or for 2026, we've presented 50 total events, and we still have over 10 events left to go. October is very very busy. I've seen a few of you out there over the weekend. We had three shows, and then we have a show tomorrow night too. And the end of the month, we have another set of four. So we're hustling, so hope to see you out there. One thing you'll notice is there's half-price beer, wine, and soda for people who go to that area or pay for that experience, as well as the five-dollar specialty cocktail that we have. And then there's enhanced culinary selections, meaning there's just kind of a lot of food. There's just a lot of different things, a little bit of something for everyone. We're kind of doing some specialty items that are gonna hopefully become just staples of that area. Again, experienced it over the weekend and heard a lot of great things, and um hopefully you'll notice it as well when you come out. So now we're number two in the United States, which is very awesome, as you know. Giving some updates on some of our social um followings. Facebook and Instagram were at almost 30,000 for each of those. We saw an increase since this time last year of over 20,000 new followers on both um total between the two platforms. Um Instagram really takes off. We do a lot more collaborating with artists now, and that's very impactful to our to our followers. Um editorial coverage over the um year, we saw 65% increase from last year when I did this report. We did 130,000 this year, we're at 198,000, and that's mostly in TV. Um, with some in radio and print as well. Um, we last year I brought you some stats on some of the surveys we did. We've done a few more show attendee surveys surveys. We started doing those after every show, so now we're getting a little more data for those like specific show by show instances. Um, some of the things that we plucked out that we thought you might be interested in is um 75% of people said that they parked within three blocks of the venue. Um, so that was a positive thing. Uh, 11% are using ride share or public transportation if they aren't driving themselves. And 69% of the people dined out, and of those 62% reported dining out in Clearwater. And then this one's one of my favorites. How many repeat visits? Five or more shows was 23% last year. And that statistic more than doubled this year. So 53% of those people polled said they come to have come to five or more shows at the sound. Obviously, two shows, 25%, but typically the people that are coming are repeat visitors. And then a little bit more feedback from some of our statistics that we got from those surveys include how likely are you to recommend coming to the Baycare Sound, and 82% said they're very likely. And the ease of parking, kind of going back to that parking within you know a few blocks, they said 79% said it was easy and likely to return. 84% are very likely to return. Some top positives included excellent excellence of the venue and overall experience, friendly and helpful staff, cleanliness of facilities, and smooth admission process, which is great to hear.