The purpose of this roundtable was to provide high level thinking from councils around the opportunities and challenges in developing a visitor economy strategy to attract more visitors and deliver growth.
- Date: Wednesday 9 March, 10am -12pm
- Chair: Kevin Boorman, Marketing and Major Projects Manager, Hastings Borough Council
Introduction
The purpose of this roundtable was to provide high level thinking from councils around the opportunities and challenges in developing a visitor economy strategy to attract more visitors and deliver growth.
The roundtable was chaired by Kevin Boorman, Marketing and Major Projects Manager at Hastings Borough Council who also delivered a scene setting presentation about the visitor economy landscape in Hastings Borough Council.
Case study
The chair introduced the roundtable by providing some examples of the challenges that Hastings Borough Council have experienced since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The borough has historically received a high number of visitors from overseas. During the COVID-19 pandemic with the international travel restrictions introduced, this market was severely impacted and although this began to pick up again in 2021, the numbers have not returned to pre COVID-19 numbers. However, the town did see a rise in the number of domestic visitors who replaced these international visitors. However, this presented logistical issues with huge swathes of visitors coming to the town, creating gridlocks and difficulty in enforcing social distancing. This raised some challenges in the short term about how to promote the wider surrounding areas and work more closely with partners in those areas to redirect some visitors to those less busy areas.
In the longer term there are concerns that long haul inbound visitors will not come back as quickly and domestic ‘staycationers’ may start to travel internationally again. Therefore, a robust long-term strategy is needed to maintain the visitor economy as on average 23 per cent of spend is from the international market. The town is also the second most deprived in southeast England and the visitor economy is important to the area.
Working in partnership with surrounding areas in 1066 Country rather than competing with neighbouring areas, will be important but also trying to retain some of those domestic visitors by creating a diverse visitor offer which links the cultural, heritage and tourism offer together to attract more visitors will be key.
The key findings from the discussion
The key points discussed at the roundtable are highlighted below:
- The COVID-19 impact varied from place to place with rural and coastal locations experiencing more visitors than urban centres. This presents long term challenges in retaining domestic spend as international travel begins to rise again.
- The package of COVID-19 support grants was helpful in supporting businesses. However, in the long-term having access to long term and flexible funding is important to develop an effective visitor economy offer.
- The visitor economy offer needs to be promoted in a sustainable way however, it is important to make the experience as easy as possible for visitors travelling to the area and between attractions.
- It is important to work closely with key stakeholders across local borders including public and private sector partners to promote a shared narrative to maximise visitors and enhance the visitor offer.
- Using social media platforms and creating a brand that taps into the unique selling point of a place can create an effective branding strategy to promote the visitor economy.
- Utilising green spaces and renovating derelict areas in towns can create vibrancy, introduce new attractions, and bring more visitors.
These points are expanded below.
The COVID-19 impact varied from place to place with rural and coastal locations experiencing more visitors than urban centres. This presents long term challenges in retaining domestic spend as international travel begins to rise again.
The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic was felt differently across various localities and regions. In general, however, the COVID-19 grant packages distributed by the government meant that councils were faced with the challenge of distributing these to businesses which led to an increase in pressure on capacity. Despite these challenges, positive outcomes were reported as a result of distributing these grants with delegates reporting that a lot of businesses were in regular contact with the council, which led to improved relationships with businesses. In Brighton, for example, the response from businesses was very proactive and the food sector adapted well to the lockdowns and began offering more home deliveries, al fresco dining etc to continue operations.
The impact has even varied within the accommodation sector with Airbnb for example doing better than traditional hotels who tend to cater to international visitors and longer stays.
Another challenge that councils faced as a result of the pandemic was the rise of ‘staycationing’ and the increase in visitors to rural, countryside and coastal areas with some reporting that these were busier than their urban centres. The increase in visitor numbers led to gridlocked streets, difficulty in enforcing social distancing and other issues including muddied footpaths, littering etc. Despite these challenges, the rise in ‘staycationing’ presented an opportunity to capture a new audience and increase domestic visitors in the long term. To utilise this opportunity, it was highlighted that it is important that there is more investment in the visitor economy because it can help retain domestic spend and grow local economies particularly as international travel restrictions are lifted and competition increases from international markets.
The package of COVID-19 support grants was helpful in supporting businesses. However, in the long-term having access to long term and flexible funding is important to develop an effective visitor economy offer.
The package of grants from the Government was very positive and was effective in supporting businesses to stay open. However, the number of grants available and the regulations around them created confusion over how to spend it. For example, some delegates reported that the restrictions around the reopening of the high streets fund made it very difficult to maximise its impact and they were not able to support businesses with it directly. The welcome back funding addressed some of these issues but also resulted in councils needing to spend the money quickly by the 31 March deadline which was difficult to do whilst maximising impact.
It also revealed skills shortages in a lot of micro businesses who were not able to process the grants and missed out due to operational issues around not having business accounts, as well as other skills shortages such as accountancy and digital skills. This highlighted an area of support for these businesses that needed to be developed.
In Lincolnshire, the county council is doing work with businesses to upskill them in accountancy and digital skills which are delivered through online masterclasses.
The delegates suggested that having access to long term funding with more flexible deadlines would support them in developing an effective visitor strategy.
The visitor economy offer needs to be promoted in a sustainable way however, it is important to make the experience as easy as possible for visitors travelling to the area and between attractions.
Promoting the visitor economy in a sustainable way is an increasingly prevalent challenge for local authorities. This is particularly important amidst the national drive to meet net zero targets as well as the recent rise in diesel and petrol prices and the impact of COVID-19 in terms of an increase in gridlock on roads. It was suggested that working together with key stakeholders particularly train operating companies will be very important to encourage people to use sustainable travel methods.
Some of the challenges are around ensuring that not only are there strong transportation links to the area itself but also to the attractions within and between the localities. In West Suffolk they have carried out consumer sentiment testing and surveys with businesses to understand the appetite around sustainable travel. The findings showed that most consumers are positive about sustainable travel. However, the challenge now for local authorities is to promote a good visitor experience by ensuring that trains and buses are accessible for buggies and wheelchair users and that they are reliable.
Community Rail Partnerships were cited as a good model to attract people to travel by train. Examples were shared in Waverley and SW Surrey where this has worked well. Another example was shared of a pilot in Suffolk where regular and bookable e-taxi services are being operated from the rail station to the market town and one of their attractions, Framlingham Castle. They are looking to extend this provision to support their events calendar subject to further funding in addition to making sure they have the right infrastructure, e.g. EV charging points.
Other options to promote a positive visitor experience are to introduce more wayfinding signs for active travel and trialling bus services between attractions. Ultimately, to encourage visitors to use sustainable travel options, it is important to make it as easy as possible for visitors to get around without using their car.
It is important to work closely with key stakeholders across local borders including public and private partners to promote a shared narrative to maximise visitors and enhance the visitor offer.
Local authorities and organisations across different geographic areas should work more closely together rather than compete to attract visitors. For example, establishing regional DMOs rather than local authority area based DMOs can help promote the place and create gateways between different destinations in the region. This can be particularly effective in regions with combined authorities where it can link into a regional culture, tourism and heritage strategy. For example, a regional DMO has been established in Bath and Bristol under the umbrella Visit West to this effect.
The culture, tourism and heritage strategy should also not be developed in isolation of each other. By cutting across different sectors and combining the visitor offer, it can maximise the reach of the whole region and enable growth across all localities.
In West Yorkshire, they have established cross working groups across the different local authorities in the region with a view to exploring how they can encourage people visiting one attraction in the region to visit another. Securing buy in from the private sector could also help enhance the regional offer and also secure funding from private attractions who are willing to promote the wider place to maximise the visitor economy.
Using social media platforms and creating a brand that taps into the unique selling point of a place can create an effective branding strategy to promote the visitor economy.
Creating a brand that is recognisable nationally and internationally can underpin the delivery of an effective visitor economy strategy.
The brand should tap into the history or the culture or selling point of the region in order to attract more visitors and make it recognisable. For example, in Hastings, 1066 Country is used to describe the town and surrounding area (three different boroughs and districts) that are connected to the battle of Hastings.
Similarly in Bath, the city has been known as a wellbeing resort throughout history due to the location of the Roman Baths. The council are looking to tap into this history to promote it as a wellbeing destination. By doing so, the surrounding countryside and other heritage and cultural offers can be connected to this wellbeing strategy which will promote an all-encompassing offer. This can help break the barriers between different attractions in the region and open the offer to a wider pool of visitors.
Social media can be used to support the promotion of this brand in innovative ways, by using popular and emerging platforms eg TikTok. In Worcestershire, they have launched a campaign including short clips showing how to pronounce Worcestershire and what the county is known for through ‘home of’ videos to promote the county. This was launched off the back of research carried out by the council to gain an understanding of how well people know Worcestershire.
It was agreed by delegates that carrying out qualitative research to understand what customers identify with and using this feedback to shape your brand and launch a campaign which taps into these insights to attract visitors is very important.
Utilising green spaces and renovating derelict areas in towns can create vibrancy, introduce new attractions, bring more visitors.
Delegates at the roundtable shared some examples of where they have delivered events by utilising green spaces and derelict land to run the events and bring vibrancy to the place and attract visitors.
For example, in Worcestershire, the district council funded an area in Bromsgrove to create a space called Birdbox which operated as a multifunctional space which hosted small concerts and cultural events.
Similarly in Brighton, they piloted a Christmas market in a redeveloped area in the town centre called Valley Gardens which featured food markets and local traders, as well as outdoor theatre performances.
One of the challenges that was cited as being a potential barrier to utilising green spaces is securing the permission to deliver the events. Parks departments can be concerned about the damage to the ground. One example that was shared to mitigate against this was the introduction of a bond on the land prior to delivering large scale events to allay these fears which some delegates shared had been a successful solution to these barriers. If damage was caused, the bond was not repaid, but used to pay for remediation works.
In terms of the internal structure of local authorities, it was suggested that bringing these departments into one directorate, can be helpful in ensuring that people from different teams can work more closely together to deliver effective solutions.
LGA support offer and additional resources
The LGA will be hosting more events including roundtables and webinars as part of our Economic Growth Support offer. For more information on all of our upcoming events and publications on Economic Growth please visit the Economic Growth Support Hub webpage.
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