Episode 101 - Destination Marketing: Tourism’s Impact on the Local Communities

Fly, drive or walk into your next vacation destination, but before you do that you should look into which cities are the spot for tourism. On this episode, joining Creative Director and host Craig Israel is Jason Therrien, President and Founder of thunder::tech in the studio and joining via Skype, Amir Eylon, President and CEO of Longwoods International to break down the love/ hate relationship with tourism from residents of destination places. 

 

 

“The term over tourism's been thrown around in the media a lot lately. You’ve probably read in recent years, you know, protests in places like Barcelona, Venice, Dubrovnik thanks to Game of Thrones, and other promotions. Those destinations really are dealing with kind of an over tourism crisis and it’s come to a major public issue there.”

 

“The visitors are not just bringing in fresh dollars to the community, supporting local business, creating jobs, etcetera, but it’s also creating tax revenue, you know. It’s no secret that if people live in a destination where they’re getting a significant amount of visitation, their tax burden at the end of the day is lower.”

 

“Over the past decade, we’ve lost a full day on average, in the average length of the American getaway or vacation.” 

 

“The majority of the tourism’s made up of small to midsize businesses. When you’re running your shop on a day-to-day, you’re so busy keeping your eyes on what’s at hand, it’s so hard to carve out that time, to keep one eye forward on the future and what’s next.”