Scottish Tourist Boards to merge into Visit Scotland

From the start of April, Scotland's 14 area tourist boards are to be merged into one. That means that Scottish tourist boards such as the Highlands and Islands Tourist Board and the Perthshire tourist board are to disappear into the large marketing board that is Visit Scotland.

We think this is a good thing in terms of marketing the country overseas. Much better to combine budgets and marketing departments to create a single unified and larger presence in the minds of people overseas considering a holiday to Western Europe.

Scotland has to fight hard to get its market share these days and to have 14 Scottish tourist boards all shouting the same thing with little voices meant the message just wasn't getting through. To have a giant getting in the faces of people in Bremen, Brussels, Amsterdam or wherever shouting "COME TO SCOTLAND, IT'S GREAT!" should have a much stronger response.

Obviously we hope it doesn't dent the jobs of anyone in the Scottish area tourist boards but it's probably inevitable that they'll find a way to sack someone. More's the pity - Scottish tourist board staff are always commited and helpful and we'd like to see more of them, not less.
If Visit Scotland now have the muscle to take on Ireland, who's tourist board is hugely successful and not only spans regions, but 2 countries, then it should work out well for Scotland.

In the meantime, here's our little voice shouting "COME TAKE YOUR HOLIDAY IN SCOTLAND, IT's GREAT!".

Posted by bigcrags @ 12:35 PM

Comments:

That's an interesting argument on the merging of the tourist boards; I do hope you're right. We were lucky to belong to the AILLST area and were extremely fortunate in having a competent, professional team running our Tourist Board. We've heard that the integration of the whole system hasn't been perfect, and, as you would expect, we're consequently worried that the togetherness (or lack of it!) will undermine the marketing for next year.

As retailers of Scottish gifts, I have to say that we also get a bit aggrieved at Tourist Boards directly competing against us - active, paid-up members of the Board. I always mention that if the Tourist Boards also ran accommodation businesses like b&bs, then they would have been shot down in flames years ago.

The argument that the profits go back into marketing Scotland may well be a good one; however, I amn't always convinced that the benefit to Scotland is shared equally among all retailers.

I'm looking forward, nonetheless, to a great tourist season in sunny (?) Helensburgh!

Cheers
Margaret

# posted by

Margaret : 10:31 PM

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