Last Updated on July 30, 2018 by Marybeth
And without actually seeing the man himself, which would, of course, make our lives complete. But the next best thing is spending time being a typical tourist (which, as you know, we usually run away from as quick as the wind.)
100% of the time we encourage you to play and stay at independently owned places. Supporting small business, experiencing authentic, unique Florida. Why settle for a cookie-cutter chain hotel, a ho-um big box chain restaurant? Falling in, lock-step, with the masses?
Recently a group of guys with whom my husband was volunteering invited him to join them for lunch, at Hooters. I shouldn’t even be telling you this, because if I get started talking about Hooters…. So I won’t. All I’ll say is that the family-run restaurants around here that serve the most amazingly delicious chicken wings are legend and many. But yet, Hooters was their choice?
But we were talking about Jimmy Buffet. Who my kids in their 20s think is just enjoyed by old people in boxy flowered shirts and strap-on black sandals. And yes, he is a huge-mega-franchise-conglomerate-corporation-empire-enterprise-brand, the fourth richest lead singer in the world who’s net worth is 550 million.
The welcome tiki at Latitudes Margaritaville
He got there somehow, from the early days as a socially conscious folk singer, then at The Chart House in Key West where he asked to be able to play in exchange for booze. His story goes from being engagingly disreputable to becoming a cultural icon, and one thing we admire so much is his business ethic – “Jimmy didn’t want to just license his name around. He wanted to work only with people who would give the customer a great experience,” writes Taffy Brodesser-Akner in her article for the New York Times, Jimmy Buffet Does Not Live the Jimmy Buffet Lifestyle. Jimmy summed it up for her “If you like what I do in goods and services, if we make you feel better after a hard day of work and you want to come blow off some steam and you pay for that, I’m going to give you your money’s worth and have a good time doing it.”
Another thing that endears us to Jimmy and makes us look past all the other stuff (30+ Margaritaville restaurants and stores, 7 LandShark Bar and Grills, 15+ Margaritaville Resorts, several Latitude communities, vacation clubs, a cruise line, Radio Margaritaville, tequila, footwear, frozen shrimp and chicken, Margaritaville Frozen Concoction Machine, LandShark Lager, a record label and a recording studio) – Jimmy gives back. Singing for Change is a charitable foundation improving the quality of life for people and empowering individuals to make positive changes in their communities. He also founded and chairs the non-profit Save the Manatee Club.
But topping the list is just the escapism Jimmy gives us. We might be old, and some of us do have boxy flowered shirts and try to wear black strap-ons when I’m not looking. And no, we don’t want to steer fellow travelers to boring giant corporately owned properties.
But when we’re headed down the road after a long trip and It’s Five O’Clock Somewhere is followed by Boat Drinks on the radio and it’s only 10:30 in the morning, and we find that we’re coming up on the exit to Latitudes Margaritaville in Daytona Beach, and the tour bus is leaving in 8 minutes, we pull off to join in on looking around the new community.
Because by the time the tour is over it will be 12 o’clock, and they gave us a coupon for a buy-one-get-one margarita at LandShark Bar and Grill!
Cool beach art at one of Latitude model homes
We joined the other mostly gray-hairs on the colorful, plushly cozy bus and listened to, yes, Changes in latitude, changes in attitude… as we drove away from the colorful sales center to the gated community underway, with colorful single family and villa models to tour.
(Make note, you must enter the place on the tour, you can’t just drive in by yourself as we’d hoped – to avoid any high pressure sales talk. Also make note they didn’t pressure us at all, whew!)
I will continue to use the word “colorful” because color was everywhere we turned, which totally floated my boat, as my my least favorite color is beige.
But guess what color house Jimmy Buffet chose for himself? BROWN. This juicy fact was whispered to us by the guide as we sat at the welcome tiki getting our instructions for our self-guided (yay! self guided!) tour, so we’re thinking it’s a secret?
Interiors by Ethan Allen.
Okay just a tiny bit kitschy but you’ve got to love the plastic cheeseburgers!
I might just want aqua shiplap on my guest bedroom wall!
Would creating this wall drive you a tiny bit crazy?
This ceiling….
And some exteriors:
The smallest single-family home, and also the most popular! Because HELLO, downsizing…
Move over, The Villages; this site, 55places.com, has ranked Latitudes Margaritaville as Florida’s Best Retirement Community!
And then of course you’ve got to complete the Jimmy Buffet day at Landshark Bar and Grill, where you can sit inside – which is awesome, if it’s raining – or outside at the bar or on the porch with the ocean view:
Just recently we became aware that “hammocking” is a thing… Who knew hammock would become a verb!
Have you visited any of Jimmy Buffet’s communities? Would you live in one? Let us know in the comments!
