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Updated: January 11, 2021 2020 Look Back

No one saw 2020 coming, and yet … some businesses thrived

A year ago, Mainebiz asked 20 business leaders for their outlook for 2020. Most painted a picture of a continued booming real estate market and consumer spending, coupled with the challenge of an ongoing labor shortage.

A year later, even with the pandemic and resulting shutdown, many of the predictions were actually on target.

The hospitality industry, including restaurants, hotels and attractions, bore the brunt of the shutdown.

But commercial real estate construction protects continued unabated, albeit with tighter, COVID-related precautions. The demand for houses, driven by out-of-state buyers, fueled a 20% increase in Maine’s median home price through November. And while many retailers saw business screech to a halt, essential stores like supermarkets and big-box stores were in some cases busier than ever. Retailers of outdoor gear (boats, bikes, paddleboards, kayaks, snowshoes, skis, etc.) couldn’t keep up with demand.

After an initial double-digit spike, the labor market continues to recover, and Maine’s unemployment rate is in line with what it was during the 2008-2009 recession, and is lower than the national rate.

Marine services / manufacturing

Financial services

Hospitality

Lobster

Our 2020 predictions reviewed

In our 20 on 20 edition published last January, we had two lists: five things we knew going into 2020, and five warning signs. Of course, the COVID-19 pandemic didn’t make either list. Here’s how those lists turned out:

5 things we knew going into 2020

1. Contractors have construction projects booked through the year: This didn’t change, as construction was one of the industries to weather the pandemic.

2. Marijuana-related businesses continue to snap up industrial real estate: Another thing that stayed true through the year as industrial real estate and the cannabis industry stayed hot.

3. Demand for housing of all kinds will continue: Housing was hotter than expected, beating the 2019 record sales year, driven largely by out-of-staters fleeing pandemic-ridden urban areas.

4. Tourism has become a bigger economic driver: The reliance on visitors was never more clear than 2020, when they couldn’t come.

5. Portland has more hotel rooms: True, but there was no one to stay in them.

5 warning signs for the economy

1. Worker shortages are affecting every industry: Despite unemployment driven by the pandemic, this still held true.

2. Rising construction costs could sabotage certain projects: Costs rose, but not to the level of sabotage.

3. Health care costs continue to eat into the bottom line: Health care was thrown into flux as the normal way of operating was no longer normal.

4. Rising consumer debt could affect big-purchase spending: Consumers stayed at home and those who still had jobs had plenty of time to shop online, it turns out.

5. The 2020 elections at all levels will be hotly contested: Yes. They were.

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