This week, The Tourism Society held a very thought provoking roundtable discussion on The Future of DMOs with Malcolm Bell, Chief Executive of Visit Cornwall; Angela Byrne, Head of Visit Isle of Man; Chris Brown, Director of Marketing Liverpool and Sheona Southern, Managing Director of Marketing Manchester.
All talked about and shared their experiences of running and managing a DMO over the last few torrid months with tourism bodies in the South West of England placed under huge pressure over the summer due to the relentless negative media coverage of crowded beaches and areas (even though infection rates did not increase during this time).
We heard that across the UK, (unsurprisingly) visitor economies have all suffered from a substantive loss of revenue with acute losses from the lack of business travel and corporate events and meetings - the challenge now will be to generate revenue over the winter months.
All also reported the ongoing struggle for local and national Governments to understand the value of the visitor economy and the need for a more coherent framework for DMOs with minimal quality standards.
Cities have undoubtedly been hit hard and hearing from both Liverpool and Manchester – it is clear that policy makers will have to ‘re-imagine what a city centre does.’ In the destinations that we manage (Kent and Hertfordshire) we are seeing an increasing demand to hold smaller meeting and hybrid events in locations outside London and also the need for spaces to hold incentive, team building and collaboration activities as a result of the change in working behaviours.
One of the positive benefits of the pandemic however has been re-engagement with local residents and their valuable insights on their local visitor economy.
What is clear though is that going forward, DMOs all over the UK desperately need more support to ensure that visitor economies can bounce back quickly and the need to have a proper debate about what DMO activities should ideally be funded by the public purse vs the private sector.
If your destination needs some help with ‘re-imagining’ its future – we have an expert team at Go To Places who can help. Get in touch by emailing us at enquiries@gotoplaces.co.uk