Resort aims for $1b from tourism

Destination Queenstown (DQ) yesterday unveiled its 2012 draft business plan, which focuses on achieving $1 billion in annual visitor spending in the resort by 2015.The plan also covers Queenstown's hosting of the Trenz tourism conference in May and the uncertainty of the global market in the wake of three recent Pacific rim disasters.

In his executive summary presented to about 100 DQ members yesterday, DQ chief executive Tony Everitt said the Queensland floods, Christchurch earthquakes and Japanese earthquake and tsunami had added "pressure and uncertainty" in the post-global financial crisis era.

However, with a resurgent US market, three new air links from Asia and a host of upcoming events including the Rugby World Cup, the resort - which attracts nearly a million visitors per year and $800 million in visitor spending - was a key part of the country's GDP and an internationally mainstream tourism destination, Mr Everitt said.'We're big and we're significant in global terms," he said.

Via an internet feed, Tourism New Zealand (TNZ) tourism operation general manager Paul Yeo spoke from the Australian Tourism Exchange conference in Sydney about the industry's response to the Christchurch earthquake and TNZ's "roadmap for recovery."

Just after the February quake, many people in the northern hemisphere thought "the South Island - the whole of New Zealand - had been devastated" with the Christchurch state of emergency being misinterpreted as being national, he said.Changing that "perception of scale" to those not familiar with the country's geography was one of the first challenges.

Another challenge had been settling on a delicate marketing approach in Japan, a nation reeling in the aftermath of disaster and which lost some of its own citizens in Christchurch.Mr Yeo said there was a feeling Australians would be late to book snow-season holidays in the resort this year and TNZ would try to counter this by quadrupling its 2010 advertising budget.

DQ planned to target early bookings through focused campaigns in Australia.Other marketing opportunities included the upcoming Trenz conference - to be staged for the first time in the resort in May - the two Hobbit movies and the Asian economic boom, Mr Yeo said.

DQ would look to have Trenz event back and had also floated the idea of a new role dedicated to snaring "iconic events" for the resort, a market many members thought had been overlooked.The draft plan goes out for member consultation before a final version is presented to the Queenstown Lakes District Council in May.

Source = odt.co.nz