Mrs Helmbold | WhaleTales Blog by Chris von Ulmenstein

It is astounding that Cape Town Tourism continues to misrepresent the tourism performance of Cape Town by using tourism information terminology that does not reflect that of the industry, demonstrating how out of touch it is with Cape Town’s tourism industry. The media release issued on Friday is a fine example of a pattern we have seen over the past two years of over self-congratulation and under-delivery.

In the past we have seen Cape Town Tourism being very flexible in its definition of the Cape’s ‘summer season‘, defining it by date to suit its purposes in showing the best tourism results. In the past its CEO Mariette du Toit-Helmbold had defined the summer season as ending at the end of February. The latest release refers to the ‘peak tourism season’, which the industry would define as the period from about 26 December – 10 January, the two weeks in which the largest number of visitors descend upon Cape Town. Not so Cape Town Tourism – the organisation defines it as December – March, without incorporating the summer months of October and November! This could cynically be observed to be for obvious reasons, given the poor tourism performance in the first two months of the 2012/2013 summer season.

Not only do they get the definition of the summer period wrong, but they also jump off President Jacob Zuma’s recent visit to Cape Town, during which he presented the tourism statistics for the 2012 calendar year, blowing their vuvuzela as to the role the city played in achieving the spectacular national tourism growth rate of 10%. They write: ‘Looking at the more recent summer season in Cape Town, it would appear that the upward trend shows no sign abating (sic)’! This is supported by a growth of 6 – 8 % ‘across most sectors of Cape Town’s tourism landscape’ between December 2012 and March 2013 – growth should be a specific percentage and not a range! Should Cape Town Tourism be proud of recording such a low growth rate for its busiest period, one may ask, even if the Cape Town Tourism growth rate range can of course not be compared with that of the President’s 2012 annual rate!

In the media release, Cape Town Tourism supports its success by referring to Amadeus Air Traffic Travel Intelligence Solution’s statement that the Johannesburg – Cape Town route is one of the ten busiest in the world. We all know that SAA has made OR Thambo airport its hub for our country, and that most international flights fly into that airport, to fly onto Durban or Cape Town thereafter. Using a confusing mix of room night sales and occupancy for December – February and March, respectively, they attempt to further prove their success, by comparing apples and pears!

They further quote visitor statistics for some of Cape Town’s most popular attractions, but only provide them for March this year, and not for their defined ‘peak tourism season’ of December 2012 to March 2013. The Table Mountain Cableway, Kirstenbosch, and Cape Point all recorded year-on-year increases, whilst Robben Island registered a decline. A creative interpretation is provided about the 3 – 6 % decline in Cape Town International airport arrivals (again odd to have a range provided) for the latest December – March period (contradicting the Johannesburg – Cape Town route brag), in that it is explained that ‘visitors are making use of alternative transport and hiring cars to get to Cape Town’!

To make sure that readers of the release understand that the tourism performance was due to Cape Town Tourism, with some help from the weather, they praise the marketing through ‘travel programmes‘ in international source markets, without elaborating on which these have been.

Whilst the word ‘Seasonality’ is not used, we are once again placated that all will be well for the Cape Town tourism industry this winter due to Cape Town Tourism running yet another Thompson’s Holiday promotion in the next five months, the programme last year not having made any significant impact, if any, on the tourism industry, which suffered greatly from a very wet winter and resultant disastrous winter performance! Mrs Helmbold urges the Cape Town tourism industry to use the quiet winter time to reflect on how to attract the ‘emerging markets’, without explaining what she and her team will be doing to create events and attract more local visitors to Cape Town in winter, in addition to a few Thompson’s ads in the Sunday Times! Mrs Helmbold is leaving Cape Town Tourism in three month’s time, so she will not be held accountable for yet another poor winter to come!

Odd is that Councillor Grant Pascoe, City of Cape Town Mayoral Committee member for Tourism, Events, and Marketing, now has to be quoted in the (badly written) Cape Town Tourism media releases, no doubt written by Cape Town Tourism itself: ‘The improved tourism figures are encouraging and call for further focused action to maintain the trend of offering excellent value-for-money packages year round. We must continue to be competitive, whilst sharpening and adapting our service-orientated approach to attract new markets. We are looking for tourism opportunities that will grow the City’s natural fortes and are inclusive whilst sustaining the current core of the tourism economy. Our spotlight on winter as an events magnet is already translating into some excellent packages to drive conversion‘. Whilst this quote from the Councillor is written in the style of Helmbold ‘psychobabble’, as described by a sharp journalist recently, the last sentence is not understandable in part, and downright misleading and untruthful!

The time has come for the City of Cape Town and Cape Town Tourism to focus its marketing action on winter, as Cape Town sells itself in the summer months!

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage

I am always astounded about how our local tourism authorities make comments to the media without foundation.

Cape Town Tourism’s latest statement refers to a nonsensical “better than average” tourist season which the Cape has just experienced over the festive season, according to the tourism body. The CEO Of Cape Town Tourism, Mariette du Toit-Helmbold, has been at her holiday home in Pringle Bay over the festive season, according to her Tweets on Twitter, and no formal survey has been conducted amongst its accommodation, restaurant and product owner members to come to such a conclusion.

In a report in the Cape Times, the festive season was described by Mrs Helmbold as “We have had a better than average holiday season with many accommodation establishments recording ‘higher than expected’ occupancy rates”. It is unclear exactly how good or bad this is meant to be, the newspaper interpreting her comments in its headline as “Cape Town had good ‘first summer season’, an exaggeration. She described the Cape’s summer season as consisting of two parts:

* “a domestic high point during December (and the school holidays)” – Mrs Helmbold has no clue of the reality of the tourism pattern in this quote, in that the festive season period is made up of a mix of international (German and UK in the main) and domestic visitors, who only arrive in the Cape in any large numbers from 26 December onwards, and who largely left the Cape to return home this past weekend, making it a very short festive season of two weeks. South African visitors to the Cape were more likely to be staying with friends and family than in accommodation establishments.

* “an international season that peaks between mid-January and the end of February” – once again, Mrs Helmbold is out of touch, in that a tourism vacuum started yesterday, and lasts for two weeks before things pick up again, and then the season will run through until Easter. February looks well-booked ahead already, mainly by British visitors, and those attending weddings.

The Times crows today “Hospitality industry coins it”, overexaggerating as it likes to do, but refers extensively to Durban. The article also quotes one-month holidaying CEO of Cape Town Routes Unlimited, Calvyn Gilfellan, in stating that tourism to Cape Town increased by 3 % over an unspecified period, and that occupancy increased to 65%. No research source for Gilfellan’s statistics is mentioned. Gilfellan expresses his satisfaction with the occupancy rate he quotes, but the industry would not be, given that this is the prime period in which it makes its money to survive the bleak winter months.

The exceptionally strong Rand, and the increase to 20 % in the VAT rate in the UK, have been prime deterrents to the UK tourists visiting the Cape, and are the region’s largest source of international tourism. Its decline has been extremely noticeable this summer season. However, the extremely severe winter weather experienced in the UK and in Europe has encouraged many tourists to come to the Cape in search of warmth and sun, which they would have had to the extreme last week, when Cape temperatures rose up to 42°C in Franschhoek, for example, Cape Town not being much cooler. The extreme heat has caused the Franschhoek water supply to be severely depleted, and citizens of the village and its visitors have been encouraged to reduce their water usage by 50 %, ironic in that the village has the largest dam in the Western Cape on its outskirts.

A blow at the start of the festive season was the snow-stuck UK visitors, who could not fly out for three or four days, costing hospitality establishments lost bookings. Seaside towns such as Plettenberg Bay and Hermanus experienced far lower visitor numbers than in previous years, Johannesburg visitors noticeably absent in the Garden Route town for the second year running. Last year the Johannesburgers were staying home to save money to renovate their homes for the World Cup, a dream which came true for a small minority only. Inland towns such as Franschhoek had lots of day visitors, but reduced numbers of guests staying over in accommodation.

It has been a different type of visitor coming to the Cape this festive season, and the domestic visitors in particular appeared to be more demanding, and in some instances dishonourable in cancelling bookings in the last minute, after the rooms have been held for them for many months, without adhering to the cancellation policy, more so than in previous years. In part this was due to the endless days of a gale-force southeaster blowing over 100 km/hr in Camps Bay, for example, followed by two days of rain over New Year, which led to some guests departing early.

POSTSCRIPT 20/1: Following our feedback to Cape Town Tourism in this blogpost, Mrs Helmbold has adjusted her definition of the second summer peak to “our international peak tourism season is from end-January until the end of March ” (Ms Helmbold had it as running from mid-January – end February in her December media release), in the newsletter which was sent to members today. We are delighted that we could be of service to Cape Town Tourism, whose CEO seems severely out of touch with the reality of tourism in the city she is meant to handle the marketing of!

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage