Everyone has their hand out.
And they are all standing in line: car manufacturers, mortgage lenders, investment bankers....and some are even flying in to Washington DC on corporate jets to cash in on the public largesse.
Which brings up maybe a not-so-obvious question: Should the nude travel industry be the next in line?
According to anecdotal evidence, the answer is as clear as....mud.
An insert to the Winter edition of "N", the house organ of The Naturist Society www.naturistsociety.com was practically begging for memberships and purchases of the society's guide to places to get naked. Was this falloff in memberships attributable solely to the rotten economy or is there something deeper here.....such as the society's mostly geriatric membership biting the dust?
Conversely, a travel special to the Chicago Tribune by writer Chris Santilli (she wrote the book, "The Naked Truth About Hedonism II") states that the nude travel industry in the prudish USofA has grown from a reported $120 million in the early 1990s to nearly $450 million today.
"Perhaps encouraged by the discreet nature of Internet travel inquiries and the abundance of anonymous message boards, nudist destinations continue to be a sunny sport in an otherwise cloudy travel industry," Santilli wrote.
She cited 2008 quantitative research that indicates that one in 10 Americans ranks "staying at a resort that offers nude recreation as extremely/very desirable."
"And nudists no longer simply gather in colonies (now considered an offensive term to nudists)," she wrote. "They enjoy luxury cruises and resorts with spas."
Santilli provided her readers with concrete examples of sans annoying clothes resorts including Caliente near Tampa www.calienteresorts.com; Sea Mountain Resort www.seamountaininn.com near Palm Springs, Hidden Beach Resort www.hiddenbeachresort.com near Cancun and Hedonism III www.superclubs.com in Jamaica-mon.
In addition, the demand for nude cruises keeps on increasing despite the major hits on 401k balances. Nancy Tiemann of Bare Necessities Tour and Travel www.bare-necessities.com recently sold 14 nude cruise packages on a recent Monday.....the normal amount for one full week.
Not all is right in paradise.
Some resorts are catering to both the nudist and lifestyles crowds (read: swingers) as if both are the same or at least very similar. "Nudists take great offense," said Andrea Hutchison of Go Classy Tours www.gonude.com. "They are hurting the growth of the (nudist) industry."
"In this era of tightening budgets, many nudist vacations make more sense," wrote Santilli. "Birthday suits never go out of fashion."
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