"tourism Chief Welcomes Figures"

[thesultanofsheight]

What the Island lacks is what techies call the "Killer App", ie a recognisable brand or benefit of focus that grabs the attention with the rest of the facilities and attractions such as the walking, golf and other 'fresh air' persuits as the 'extras' that add to the 'worth' of visiting.

 

It is recognised in tourism circles that if people can be tempted to visit a location for a specific event, they will often return again at a different time *if* there are the reasons to come back... Don't most businesses claim that it is easier to retain existing customers than it is to attract new ones?

 

We have 40,000 visitors every year for the TT, some of them must have interests in addition to bike specifics. 2007 will see more coverage for the Island than it will know what to do with, and what will it have to show for itself for those who ask "What else is there about the Island when the bikes and their specific attractions have packed up and left?".

 

Forgive a newbie for some instant criticism, but I assume you are the same Mark Atherton who is standing for MHK and therefore I would advise you that if your successful I hope you don't get the tourist job as you seem to be living in some parallel universe when it comes to what brings people to the IOM.

 

I tried to paraphrase many of the points you made but really, apart from the observations about the internet what planet are you on? As for a "Killer App" - you name one. You name one single thing that the IOM could do that's unique that couldn't be better or cheaper to attend elsewhere? Apart from bringing a load of cheapskates over for walking or cycling holidays.

 

Whilst your at it please name the reasons why any of the 40,000 (sic) TT visitors would want to come back (or could afford to come twice more to the point after having their pants taken down the first time)? There is quite simply bugger all to do here, I know it, you know it, most people on these forums know it. If the tourist board was pushed they know it too. We are so niche we might as well target everyone called Nigel who lives in the Midlands for special "Nigel weeks".

 

Even accepting that the "Rock on Rock" idea is good, lets face it it will be mostly locals there or tourists who happen to be here because who would spend the time and money to fly or sail here and stay when you can go to any number of better events in the UK by car, train, or national express?

 

I would like to get a copy of your manifesto if this is your answer to the tourism crisis.

[Addie]

Tourism, as we once knew it, is dead!

 

I remember a seminar hosted by the Tourist Board where we all had to come up with ideas for stimulating the tourist industry.

 

After watching the 'team leaders' faffing about with SWOT boards and flow charts whilst chunnering away in the most appalling jargon, it seemed to me that the IOM tourist industry could well be doomed.

 

Shouldn't the tourist industry be treated far more seriously by having a name-change and being more closely associated with Finance and/or Trade and Industry. With, of course, someone with great experience in charge.

 

In the Tourism and Trade departments we seem to have had two MHKs, with no experience whatsoever being the face, voice and head of the departments (when something went well that is). I always thought that they should be there to observe, make sure that money was being spent wisely, and take the rap when things went pear-shaped. The professionals meanwhile (that I'm assuming are hired for their excellence) being allowed to do their job and apply their skills to best effect.

 

The as yet uncoordinated dog's breakfast of an event that promises to be TT2007 is a disgrace. What the hell is the Tourist department doing? Who's co-ordinating the event, the availability of travel, accommodation, events, the attractions and the prices?

 

I wouldn't come for a holiday and I love the place!

[Frances]

Apart from bringing a load of cheapskates over for walking or cycling holidays.

Whay are walkers 'cheapskates' - they occupy B&B's or self-catering accomodation - often out of season - they need feeding + transport and often return to the Island whilst requiring little in terms of infrastructure. I even know several bikers who come over for the TT/MGP and then stay on to do some walking. Look at the successful Lake district tourist industry, and with the increasing number of early retirees (often from successful businesses) there should be a market that could be exploited.

[Gladys]

You are missing the point somewhat in continuing the theme of tourism initself; it is, or should be, a much wider drive to market the IOM in all its aspects, something that the re-branding should have kicked-off, but what co-ordinating department is running that? Addie has the idea.

[Ripsaw]

Forgive a newbie for some instant criticism, but I assume you are the same Mark Atherton who is standing for MHK and therefore I would advise you that if your successful I hope you don't get the tourist job as you seem to be living in some parallel universe when it comes to what brings people to the IOM.

Yep. I'm the one and the same. Difficult to deny seeing as my name and "Candidate" are in my User Details and Signature respectively.

I tried to paraphrase many of the points you made but really, apart from the observations about the internet what planet are you on? As for a "Killer App" - you name one. You name one single thing that the IOM could do that's unique that couldn't be better or cheaper to attend elsewhere? Apart from bringing a load of cheapskates over for walking or cycling holidays.

 

Whilst your at it please name the reasons why any of the 40,000 (sic) TT visitors would want to come back (or could afford to come twice more to the point after having their pants taken down the first time)? There is quite simply bugger all to do here, I know it, you know it, most people on these forums know it. If the tourist board was pushed they know it too. We are so niche we might as well target everyone called Nigel who lives in the Midlands for special "Nigel weeks".

I can not name a 'killer app', I said we don't have one. I can not name things that visitors can do better or cheaper elsewhere for you as I said pointed out that there are negligable reasons to visit. I don't know why you started your post with "Forgive a newbie for critisism" as that was the point of my post, and you've agreed with me.

 

Even accepting that the "Rock on Rock" idea is good, lets face it it will be mostly locals there or tourists who happen to be here because who would spend the time and money to fly or sail here and stay when you can go to any number of better events in the UK by car, train, or national express?

How successful the 'Rock' will be and who attends? Who knows?

 

I would like to get a copy of your manifesto if this is your answer to the tourism crisis.

My answer to Tourism?

 

I'm local, I recognise that there is a shortage of quality facilities for locals and visitors.

 

I opened saying that there are people who don't jet off to sunnier climes and we are centrally located. I said that there are some within the industry don't offer online booking or value for money products so are turning away the few that do show initial interest. I said that seeds need time to grow and develop and I pointed out that the Tourism Strategy (which is available for public consumption) recognises the niche aspects.

 

Where are you criticising me?

[Lonan3]

It is high time that the 'Leisure' element in 'Tourism & Leisure' became the principal focus.

The reason that tourism began, and continued and grew in the first place, was that the leisure facilities were available to engage and entertain visitors.

In many cases, these facilities were not aimed specifically at visitors, but grew from their original task of providing entertainment for the local population. But the whole history of tourism in the IoM is blighted with examples of opportunities missed.

For example, it was the first place to have a 'holiday camp' and yet, when they began to be perceived as unfashionable, the idea was immediately abandoned. And yet, I recently spent a 4-day break at Butlins in Skegness where the facilities included two huge theatres, a 3-screen cinema complex, a magnificent swimming pool, a funfair, plus things such as archery lessons and football coaching - all of which were available on a day/evening pass to people who weren't staying at the complex.

Instead of simply abandoning what they had, they'd developed it so that, for example, the old-style chalets had been replaced with well-equipped 'apartments,' and the result was that at half-term the place was absolutely crammed with people while the week that we went, after the UK half-term, a specialist 1960s theme meant that it was still completely packed.

But that's what happens when you have a business being run with a bit of imagination and a willingness to change to meet the requirements of its clients - and that's why it could never happen here!

[Addie]

[off topic, blame lonan3 lol]

 

Butlins! I'd never been in my life but we and another two couples plus kids went to Butlins Minehead for the last week of the season one time.

 

The cost in that last week was absolutely peanuts.

 

Our "County Suite" - oooh-eeer - was absolutely fine. The shows were great and the films, pools and facilities were excellent.

 

The antics in the dining room were the source of the greatest entertainment though.

 

After the meal, a person arrived with and extremely large red plastic container which she banged down on our table and into which she proceeded to scrape the discarded contents from our plates.

 

She then left it there while she brought over neighbouring table's plates to scrape into her box. It resembled the slopping out process as seen on prison films.

 

Meanwhile an array of candle lit birthday cakes were held head high and paraded around the room whilst we all sang Happy Birthday to the world and its mother - every night!.

 

It was better than Ken Dodd!

 

[/on topic]

[Frances]

The reason that tourism began, and continued and grew in the first place, was that the leisure facilities were available to engage and entertain visitors.

In many cases, these facilities were not aimed specifically at visitors, but grew from their original task of providing entertainment for the local population.

I think you will find that near 100% of tourist facilities were specially built for the visiting season - use by the locals outside of this was purely ancillary to their main revenue generation.

The huge dancehalls were late 1890's with heyday pre WW1 (post WW1 there were increasing comments that Douglas was still reliant on its Victorian past - Summerland was a last desperate fling to recover a by then dying industry). The accomodation dated in the most part from 1870's to 1890's but very little post WW1 was built. A major problem with that short visiting season was employment outside of the period - during the season few regular jobs could compete with the high wages/tips etc but post September there was only the winter work program. It is only post the 1980's with an increasing, and more important increasingly affluent, population have facilities such as the NCC been built (though compared with Shetland in which virtually every community of more than 1000 has a modern swimming pool + leisure centre, the Island is very poor equipped)

[thesultanofsheight]

Where are you criticising me?

 

Because all I saw was criticism and stating the obvious. Anyone can do that. I would have thought as a electoral candidate you might have made a few suggestions or tried to put some action points across rather than saying in a longwinded way that the tourism board are crap and the industry has no direction.

 

That is the view of the man in the street, not the sort of comment we might expect from someone who could be put in charge of things if successfully voted in. We all know its rubbish - your the one looking to be elected. What you going to do about it?

[Gladys]

Again, everyone is trying to recapture the lost days of high volume, low per capita spend tourists. We cannot compete in this market any longer.

 

We need to widen the net to encourage more visitors but for reasons other than strictly tourism. Certainly, niche tourism still has a place, but we need other reasons to encourage visitors, be it for business, leisure or some organised event such as a conferences, TT or rallies etc. In the latter category we are encouraging people to visit because of the event and how it can be successfully staged, NOT the Island and we need slick marketing to encourage that aspect.

 

A pleasant by-product would, of course, be the fantastic setting of the IOM, but the facilities on offer and the SERVICE that the IOM Government marketing department would provide in assisting these events would give the IOM its USP, not as currently where we are really trying to sell ourselves as a dying tourist centre in need of regeneration.

 

Successful marketing is as much about believing in your own product and to do so you must have a product that someone wants. At the moment, not many want a summer family holiday on the beach on the IOM. But some companies, for example, may want a weekend retreat for senior executives to do a bit of 'out of the box thinking', 'pushing the envelope' etc. What better place than the IOM! Beautiful setting, but look at the facilities, superb telecoms (?!) so every exec. has instant access to his work desk, if necessary, or complete cut-off. All sourced by a government department that knows the facilities and can pull together various strands to tailor the experience.

 

Just a few moments staring at a screen and wondering why anyone goes anywhere woud surely throw up some possible avenues to explore.

[thesultanofsheight]

Again, everyone is trying to recapture the lost days of high volume, low per capita spend tourists. We cannot compete in this market any longer.

 

I don't think we ever did. I worked in the tourist industry in the early 80's and it was always the first intake at easter that got to sleep in the damp beds as the hoteliers had simply locked up and gone to Spain between seasons. They came back a week before easter did a bit of painting and slung some sheets on.

 

That was the reality then, but its different of course now as people expect certain levels of service and quality particularly when travel costs are so high.

 

If we analyse the industry over the last 10 years ignoring TT Week we have not had a tourist industry at all; we have had more people come for business, more support service providers needing places to stay, and the migrant building industry and film productions providing turover. Its the dwindling of these travellers (who were never strictly tourists but were counted as such) that is having its effect now. We have no tourists at a time when we also have no "tourists".

[Gladys]

We definitely did up until the mid 70's, Glasgow Fare and Wakes Week when the prom was athrong with holidaymakers on their (cheerily) enforced annual holiday when their factory/mill/shipyard closed down. But you are right, the emphasis should not be on tourism per se, but of encouraging a whole range of visitors who wouldn't necessarily think of their visit as a holiday is the trick.

[haX0red_Account]

Again, everyone is trying to recapture the lost days of high volume, low per capita spend tourists. We cannot compete in this market any longer.

 

We need to widen the net to encourage more visitors but for reasons other than strictly tourism. Certainly, niche tourism still has a place, but we need other reasons to encourage visitors, be it for business, leisure or some organised event such as a conferences, TT or rallies etc. In the latter category we are encouraging people to visit because of the event and how it can be successfully staged, NOT the Island and we need slick marketing to encourage that aspect.

 

A pleasant by-product would, of course, be the fantastic setting of the IOM, but the facilities on offer and the SERVICE that the IOM Government marketing department would provide in assisting these events would give the IOM its USP, not as currently where we are really trying to sell ourselves as a dying tourist centre in need of regeneration.

 

Successful marketing is as much about believing in your own product and to do so you must have a product that someone wants. At the moment, not many want a summer family holiday on the beach on the IOM. But some companies, for example, may want a weekend retreat for senior executives to do a bit of 'out of the box thinking', 'pushing the envelope' etc. What better place than the IOM! Beautiful setting, but look at the facilities, superb telecoms (?!) so every exec. has instant access to his work desk, if necessary, or complete cut-off. All sourced by a government department that knows the facilities and can pull together various strands to tailor the experience.

 

Just a few moments staring at a screen and wondering why anyone goes anywhere woud surely throw up some possible avenues to explore.

so true- loads of crappy, narrow-minded, expensive, boring places round the world get visited by niche crowds. Shocking lack of vision at the top.

[Chinahand]

Agreed Lard, I think the time has come to really abandon any kind of separate tourist department, just what industry is it supporting? Its an anachronism from an age which is never going to be revived in the same volume or style.

 

What we do have, however, is a product that could appeal to a niche market, but whether that is deserving of a separate department is a different matter.

 

But that is just one aspect of wider IOM image as I suspect that most people, apart from family, visit the IOM now for business. Perhaps the whole marketing of the IOM for business and leisure should be centralised in one IOM marketing department which would have different areas focussing on different reasons for visiting, but all with the common theme of marketing the IOM as a place to visit and to facilitate those visits.

 

I think there is alot in what you say Gladys ... use the freedom to florish rebranding to abolish the Department of Tourism and Leisure ... and create an IOM Marketing Department or similar. This would be be both internal and external ... in marketing Mann we need an NSC etc: these are features which give us our good quality of life. The new department woud attempt to gett people to see the importance of our environment as a part of our brand ... YUCK I hate business speak!

 

The FT Survey has some comments on this, especially numbers:

 

At present, there are 320,000 visitors a year. About 90,000 come on business, while 110,000 stay with friends and relatives, leaving perhaps 120,000 who may use the island’s hotels and restaurants for holidays or day trips.

 

“That is at a plateau and we want to grow it again,” says Mr Le Page. There is a clear need to do more to extend the tourist season – an area where the regular visits made to the island by film crews has helped.

 

One opportunity is conferences. The island is back on the circuit after a refurbishment of the Villa Marina, the main Douglas venue. Bookings are starting to grow for “social” conferences such as Rotary Club gatherings.

 

Another target is to attract the 30 to 45 year old age group, who will find plenty of scope for activity holidays: the island’s rugged landscape and open spaces make it a good place for outdoor pursuits from gentle walks and golf to mountain biking and extreme sports. Those with young children will find quiet beaches, museums and quaint railways to keep their offspring amused.

 

In practice, the typical visitor is older. But the island says that three-quarters are ABC1, compared with less than half a few years ago. Short-term breaks are typical, with five days the average stay.

 

However, the island is perceived as failing to compete adequately on quality. Attractive hotels and noteworthy restaurants are few and the service culture is recognised to be in need of improvement.

 

Such factors inhibit not just the island’s tourism but also its ambitions to be a place to live for well-heeled and globally-minded entrepreneurs.

 

Allan Bell, the treasury minister, says: “If the Isle of Man is going to succeed as a place to attract new residents we have to focus on quality in everything we do. That means having quality hotels, restaurants and retailers.

 

Its a good series of articles. Shows us to be quietly confident and diversified with a great environment! That's what I feel about the Island!

[Juan Kerr]

Allan Bell, the treasury minister, says: “If the Isle of Man is going to succeed as a place to attract new residents we have to focus on quality in everything we do. That means having quality hotels, restaurants and retailers.

 

I know this is evil as I think Alan is a good MHK but as MHK for Ramsey how does he reconcile that statement?

 

Its a shit-tip. You only have to get 2 miles from Ramsey to go "F**k that" and go somewhere else (like somewhere where the public bogs are open on a week day).

 

We can have all these high ideals and aspirations, but the reality is that your constituency is one of the least appealing shopping / hotel / holiday / dining places around. Unless you want to visit a shit antiques shop on the main shopping street and have a fight in a pub you avoid Ramsey like the plague. How can that be a focus on quality?