Five takeaways from the 2022 Jersey Shore summer season

And just like that, it’s the off-season. It was, mostly, a smooth summer, free of major pandemic lockdown drama, and decent beach weather that, to be honest, is still going. The ocean got warm, then it got cold, then it warmed up again. Nobody could find enough staff. People ate in more. They brought furniture to the beach and big tarps for shade held down by sand pockets . People with more money bought out people with less money, knocked their homes down and built bigger houses. There were some post-Labor Day casualties of beloved restaurants. People embraced September and booked airBnBs.

What does it all mean? Here are five takeaways from summer 2022.

Overall, business was down, with some restaurants and other businesses reporting being as much as 20 percent off from 2021.

But 2021 was an unexpectedly robust season, when Cape May County, saw $6.6 billion in tourism spending, a 96 percent recovery of pre-pandemic tourism dollars.

“Competing with last summer is not a fair fight,” said Cape May County Tourism Director Diane Wieland.

And some towns, like Brigantine, saw a growing economy this summer, as second home owners spent more time at their Shore homes, or moved there permanently, said Mayor Vince Sera. The school district saw 40 new students enrolled this fall, he said.

Brigantine’s town center was completely filled with shops for the first time in years, with new businesses like Kook Burger, Mission Cafe, Brig Surf and the Dunes Art Gallery.

“Honestly, this has been one of our busiest summers we’ve ever had,” Sera said. “Ever since COVID , we’ve seen a huge increase in the year-round population. That’s caused a lot of businesses to open.”

Wieland said she was still optimistic that the shoulder season would make up for any decreases experienced during the summer. And people seemed to be embracing a longer season. Ocean City was named AirBnB’s top destination for the fall.

“I don’t think, after everyone’s done, the whole year will be off,” she said. “We’re not going to be a 2021 which was an exceptional year. We’re seeing the shoulder season expanding. More properties are going on to rent in the fall and the winter.”

With restaurants stretched for staff while rents, wages, supplies and food costs were soaring, many cut back their hours and worked on razor thin margins.

Some seemed to just cross the Labor Day finish line, and then announce they were closing.

Among the casualties: A trio of Ocean City stalwarts: Voltaco (after 68 years), Surf Cafe, and Wards Pastry (after 98 years) all announced they were closing. Pic-a-Lilli pub on Tennessee Avenue in Atlantic City was reported to be sold and will close.

The Red Eyed Crab restaurant on the Delaware Bay in Commercial Township temporarily shut its doors in late July, citing high food costs, like a box of potatoes going from $17 to $48, and staffing shortages. They have since re-opened.

A few didn’t even make it to July. Los Amigos, a staple in Atlantic City for decades, shut its doors in June. Sack-o-Subs in Ventnor shut down on Memorial Day, then re-opened with new management, then shut down after a June fire. It remains closed.

With the border open for the first time since 2019, the Canadians who love to drive in large groups all the way to Wildwood and other Shore destinations and stay in motels and campgrounds were back!

Wieland said the county started advertising to Canadians in December saying, “We missed you,” and ended up with a return rate of about 75 to 80 percent from pre-pandemic levels.

“The Canadians are back,” she said. “And they are making reservations for next year.”

Some sublime and free summer traditions thrived this summer where everything from gas prices to coffee cups shot up in price. The Cape May County Zoo, free to all, was packed all summer.

Free was ... in.

The Chicken Bone Beach Jazz series drew a crowd of between 500 and 1,000 people every Thursday on the Boardwalk at the Kennedy Plaza stage in Atlantic City, and founder Henrietta Shelton says it might have been more had the series got its funding secured earlier and its schedule in place.

As it was, Shelton and music director Isaac Nicholson delivered their usual first-rate series of internationally-known artists to a crowd that stretched all the way back to Boardwalk Hall, where regulars set up their camping chairs and, in a few cases, makeshift little bars.

Attend this series every week, and by the end of summer, you’ve got yourself a festival to rival the free Charley Parker Jazz Festival in New York City’s parks or Cape May’s Exit Zero Jazz Festival .

This summer, highlights included vibraphonist Stephon Harris, Captain Black (Big Band), Matthew Whitaker and pianist Helen Sung, who brought acclaimed violinist Regina Carter to the Boardwalk.

Shelton says the series draws a devoted local crowd as well as people from New York, Philly and D.C, who plan their vacations around the beautiful starlit shows.

Mondays at Kennedy Plaza saw Broadway on the Boardwalk and Wednesdays was Tony Mart’s New Orleans-inspired series, also with devoted fan bases.

Elsewhere, Margate’s weekly music series under a tent by its library brought some high quality concerts, like the Arkai duo featuring Jonathan Miron and Philip Sheegog and their unique fusion of jazz, classical and rock, an unexpected treat especially if you just happened to be running by (as I was). Woah, not your basic Shore cover band (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

Behind it all was the steady drumbeat of building, continuing a transformation that began with the Great Recession in 2008, continued after Hurricane Sandy in 2012 and accelerated during the pandemic, a transformation that is turning Shore towns one by one into wealthy summer retreats for the Range Rover and Porsche set.

» READ MORE: Ventnor is becoming bougie, but is the Jersey Shore leaving the middle class behind?

In Avalon, town officials were weighing boutique hotels, and there was widespread anxiety that the old sense of place many associated with Shore towns, that place where middle class people could buy or keep in the family or even afford to rent ranchers and bungalows six blocks from the beach, was disappearing.

In Margate, a rash of three-story, six and seven bedroom new construction led some to wonder if they’d lost their favorite town, even as they continued to live or vacation there. If a town was getting fancier, was that a good thing? Nobody was completely sure.