Tag Archives: Destination Marketing

Threatened ‘jealous’ Durban attacks Cape Town about tourism ‘ambush marketing’ at Indaba 2014!

Wesgro PosterDurban and Cape Town have had a gentle rivalry when it comes to attracting tourists, which has never been overtly competitive and has been largely collegial, with a joint campaign on National Geographic to market the two cities, to save marketing monies. Now the relationship appears to have reached rock-bottom, with an angry Durban Tourism attack on Cape Town for its alleged ‘ambush marketing‘ of Indaba 2014, the tourism expo held in Durban, which drew to a close on Monday.

In the past other South African cities, but Durban in particular, have been annoyed that Cape Town attracts the bulk of international tourists, and that this is reflected by SA Tourism, in that it proudly features Table Mountain in much of its tourism communication, being a national icon for our country.  SA Tourism and Durban were irked that World Travel Market Africa was held in Cape Town a mere week before the start of Indaba, funded in part by the City of Cape Town, and attracting a fair number of exhibitors and visitors, and receiving praise for the event.  SA Tourism made a point of confirming that it would only support Indaba, there not being enough capacity for two tourism trade shows in our country, in its opinion.

Philip Sithole, head of Durban Tourism, appears to be paranoid about Cape Town, complaining to Southern African Tourism Continue reading →

How festive will the Festive Season be for Cape Town and Western Cape?

Festive Lights Switch On 2012City of Cape Town Councillor for Tourism, Events, and Marketing, Grant Pascoe, has a lot of image polishing to do after he and his Tourism, Events, and Marketing Directorate were in the dog box, having to undergo an embarrassing forensic audit recently.  It is annoying to read his misleading optimistic view of the Festive Season, clearly without substantiation.  The same applies to a media release from Cape Town Tourism, making projections based on poor market research techniques.

The Councillor brags in an article in the City of Cape Town’s weekly newsletter, just two days after the Cape Town Tourism media release was dispatched,  that Cape Town ‘is gearing up for a bumper festive season‘, undefined and unsubstantiated, adding that the City plans to position itself as the ‘Events Capital of Africa’, a surprise given that no events have been created since the Councillor established his Directorate headed by Anton Groenewald.  In fact the Directorate, with an annual budget of R500 million, has not shown any sign of tourism marketing action, other than laying on some small scale soccer matches at the Cape Town Stadium, a sport which Pascoe personally is particularly fond of!  Groenewald ironically was quoted recently in saying that Cape Town has lost out on a number of events due Continue reading →

Cape Town loses numerous events due to lack of bidding budget!

 

 Cape Town StadiumThe City of Cape Town has lost 12 bids for new Events for Cape Town in the past six months, and has lost two existing events to other cities, said Anton Groenewald, Executive Director of the City of Cape Town Tourism, Events, and Marketing Directorate, at the Annual General Meeting of Cape Town Tourism two weeks ago.

According to Southern African Tourism Update, Groenewald blamed the ‘City’s limited bidding budget‘ and the stronger international currencies of other bidding countries for the poor track record. The weaker Rand this year affected the costs of bidding for international events, he said:  ‘Exchange rate fluctuation impacts on our ability to bid because almost all competitive bids are in euros, pounds or dollars. This means that at the time of bidding earlier this year, the exchange rate was such that events and concerts at that time became financially unviable because the dollar or euro equivalent was more than we could absorb. Secondly, events and global brands are asking higher and larger fees because other city destinations are paying larger upfront fees to secure their participation. So a fee last year of R3,5m for an event has now increased to US$1,5m (R9,9m), because that is what another destination paid this global brand. We simply cannot compete at these rates.  While Cape Town seems to enjoy international recognition and awareness as a destination, what we do not have is an increase in enquiries and how to convert this into purchases’.

Groenewald’s Directorate has a massive budget at R560 million, out of the Continue reading →

Tourism spend in Cape Town grew by 5,6% p.a. since 2009, claims (misleading) Grant Thornton study!

cape-town-with-table-mountain-and-stadium1It is interesting to see how Councillor Grant Pascoe, City of Cape Town Mayoral Committee member for Tourism, Events, and Marketing, has interpreted the results of a Grant Thornton survey of ‘spend on tourism in Cape Town‘, to obtain maximum PR spin out of the survey results.

While the Grant Thornton study shows that the average rate of growth between 2009 and 2012 was 5,6 % per annum, there were increases and decreases in revenue in this period, the revenue generated having peaked in 2010 at R16 billion, growing from R12,4 billion in 2009 to R14,6 billion in 2012, a City of Cape Town media release reveals.  Fascinating is that the value of the tourism industry in Cape Town in 2009 was quantified at R 17,3 billion, when the City announced the appointment of the consultancy in conducting the study.  Now the 2009 value has been reduced by R5 billion – could this have been done to make the tourism industry show growth instead of a loss in revenue over the 2009 – 2012 period?! 

The tourism consultancy was contracted to conduct a three year study on the Continue reading →