Get paid to cash in your PTO — if you go to St. Pete-Clearwater beaches

Visit St. Pete-Clearwater is giving travelers the ultimate incentive to cash in those unused vacation days: up to $250 cash for booking a vacation to the area before the end of the year. 

It’s a simple offer. Book a trip to St. Petersburg or Clearwater through VisitSPC.com/PTO for any time before the end of 2025, and the tourism bureau will give you a $50 digital Visa gift card for each day of your stay, up to five days. That’s up to $250 in extra pocket money to spend a week enjoying Florida’s Gulf coast. 

The new campaign is a call to action, Visit SPC leadership sasy, bolstered by a recent study from the Society for Human Resource Management that found roughly 48% of employees in the U.S. expect to have unused, paid vacation time left over by the end of the year. 

“Don’t let your PTO go to waste when there’s still time to take a beach break,” Steve Grimes, chief marketing officer at Visit St. Pete-Clearwater, says in the release. “Fall and early winter is the sweet spot here — perfect weather, lots of events and now, we’re giving you a little extra spending money for that sunset meal or night out on the town.”

In addition to the extra clams visitors can score by booking a beach vacation through Visit SPC, the tourism bureau also offers exclusive deals on its website like the FunShine Savings Passport, a free, digital pass for deals and discounts at more than 50 local restaurants, shops, attractions, tours and excursions. Download the FunShine Savings Passport directly to your smartphone and save on admission to attractions such as the Dali Museum, Clearwater Marine Aquarium, Imagine Museum, Great Explorations Children’s Museum, FloridaRAMA, the Museum of Fine Arts and more. 

The St. Pete-Clearwater area boasts more than 35 miles of pristine, white sand beaches consistently named amongst the top beaches in the world by publications including Travel + Leisure magazine, USA Today and Tripadvisor, the organization says. And with temperatures forecast to hover in the upper 70s and 80s through the holidays, Visit SPC makes a compelling case for those looking to trade snow shovels for sand castles.