This Is Jersey

THE tourism industry is having a hard time of it at the moment, but we have a plan. It’s not much of a plan yet, and it’s several years late, but at least it’s a plan and a step forward.

The plan is to put more effort into events that will not only keep the tourists happy when they are here, but might actually persuade them to visit the Island in the first place.

Heard that one before? Yes, so have I, but then I admit to being overcome with a strong sense of déjà vu at tourism conferences when next year’s plans are announced. Last week’s event was no exception.

Perhaps there’s nothing new to be said about our second most important industry, but if I didn’t know better, I would think that we were in a rut.

Perhaps it’s me that’s in a rut because I keep on criticising our rather feeble attempts to revitalise the tourism sector. I’m certainly not critical of those involved in the industry, most of whom work extremely hard in difficult circumstances. It’s the years of neglect by the States and the wholesale apathy of the public that are largely to blame for the lack of progress in the industry.

For example, I know that last week’s tourism conference took place while the States was still sitting, but how many States Members would have bothered to turn up to hear what was happening in this vital industry? Certainly very few, if any, have bothered in previous years.

Part of the problem, of course, has been the failure of industry leaders and officials to get the message across about just how important tourism is to the Island. It’s not just a revenue earner. It makes a vital contribution to maintaining the Island’s infrastructure, including transport, hotels, restaurants, bars, activities, attractions and retail outlets and it even creates a few jobs, which we might very well need in the future. The finance industry is not enough on its own.

So why don’t we put more effort into it? It’s true that when the industry is up against the ropes, the States often step in at the last minute and more money is made available.

They did that this year, with an extra £700,000 which supported the Island’s TV advertising campaign. It didn’t have much of an impact, of course, perhaps because it was very much an emergency measure which may have been too late because the emergency was already upon us. Perhaps if the department had received that £700,000 earlier in the year it might have made more of an impact.

Anyhow, the performance of the industry has not been stellar this year and we are back to where we were a couple of years ago.

Well, what can you expect? Nearly all tourism destinations have been hit hard this year because of the recession, and our performance has been better than most.

It’s obvious that we were bound to be badly affected by the collapse of consumer confidence in the UK, which is by far our biggest market for tourists. After all, if you put all your eggs in one basket and that basket breaks, you’re bound to get a lot of egg on your face.

The French market was not much better for the Island because France is also in deep recession. But what about the biggest European market of all? Well, the number of tourists from Germany coming to the Island this year was actually up 13%, and next year the capacity on the German routes is being increased by a huge 32%. That’s still only a few thousand people but it’s a good base to work on and tourism officials are very well aware of this huge business opportunity.

However, as last week’s conference proved, almost everything the department does is still geared to our long-standing traditional markets of mainly the Midlands and South of England. The marketing experts can tell you in great detail who is likely to want to come to Jersey from the UK, even down to the street in which they live. Why isn’t even a fraction of this effort devoted to developing new markets in Germany, for example?
Probably because they don’t have the time or resources, which is precisely my point.

But surely, as the finance sector has realised, we have to diversify away from relying almost totally on UK-centred business. If we want to hedge our bets we simply shouldn’t rely so heavily on one market, particularly when there is plenty of choice.

However, some of the limited resources that are available are now going to be devoted to creating events which will give more people more reasons for wanting to come to the Island. This is such an obvious strategy that we’ve been talking about it for years; we just haven’t done much about it.

Indeed, I remember well a very famous firm of event specialists devising a detailed plan for the Island to follow, including a list of ‘quick wins’. Not only did we not get any of the quick wins, we didn’t have any of the long-term ones either.

Now we have a new expert helping us and he too has an impeccable pedigree and should be able to help produce a highly effective strategy for developing event-lead tourism.

His presentation at last week’s tourism conference was indeed very inspiring, but hardly a revelation. Everyone has known for years that we should concentrate on a few local events and develop them so that they are attractive to tourists as well as Islanders. It’s simply a question of getting behind the idea and devoting resources to it.

This particular expert hasn’t been working with the Island for very long and whether he will have any more luck than previous experts, remains to be seen.
But we can only wish him well in his efforts. After all, it’s better to live in hope than in despair.

Peter Body is editor of Business Brief magazine

Article posted on 10th November, 2009 - 3.00pm