NewcastleGateshead Initiative partner update meeting 13 June 2014: North East England Tourism Awards, EAT! NewcastleGateshead, media coverage, new pocket guide and more...
6. • Raise the industry’s profile
• Assist in changing consumer
perceptions
• Provides case studies
• Examples of best practice
• Improves business
• Motivates owners and employees
• Recognises the fantastic quality of
experience
• Celebrates our joint success!
25 Years of Excellence
7. 1. Accessible Tourism
2. Business Tourism
3. Holiday Park/Holiday Village of the Year
4. Self-Catering Holiday Provider of the Year
5. B&B, Guest Accommodation of the Year
6. Large Hotel of the Year
7. Small Hotel of the Year
8. Large Visitor Attraction of the Year
9. Small Visitor Attraction of the Year
10. Sustainable Tourism Award
11. Taste of England Award
12. Tourism Event of the Year
13. Tourism Experience of the Year
14. Tourism Pub of the Year
15. Visitor Information Provider of the Year
16. Travel Article of the Year
17. Tourism Superstar
18. Outstanding Contribution to Tourism
VisitEngland Awards for Excellence 2015 Categories
9. Sustainable Tourism Award
Wheatland Farm Eco Lodges – Gold 2013
Winning gold for sustainability was a huge surprise for our tiny
business and a real recognition of our ethics and commitment.
Entering awards is like joining an 'excellence' mentoring scheme.
Making your case focuses you on your strengths, judging gives you
advice and a national benchmark. Over two or three years we've gone
from winning bronze at county level to gold nationally. Of course that
reflects our own determination and vision, but awards have certainly
helped us broaden our sustainability beyond our core focus. They give
you a clear picture of excellence, and that's good for business.
10. Motivational
Abbey Guest House, Oxon: Access - Highly Commended 2013
• It has meant a lot to me personally to know that we really do cater
for 'all' or as near as possible. It has given me personal confidence
to allow me to 'sell' both me and the business in marketing terms.
The Lowry Hotel, Manch’ter: Business Tourism – Silver 2013
• We are delighted that The Lowry Hotel was awarded Silver in the Best
Business Tourism category of the Visit England Awards for Excellence. It's a
wonderful reward for the whole team and recognition of their ongoing
commitment to delivering the best quality customer service.
11. Celebrate success
East Riddlesden Hall, Yorks:
Small visitor attraction – Gold 2013
• We received excellent publicity following the award. Our local
community really got behind us and winning the award gave them a
sense of pride. Since winning the award, the number of paying
visitors to the property has increased by 36%.
• Our staff and volunteers have been motivated by winning and are
proud to say they work/volunteer at the best Small Visitor Attraction
in England.
32. Britain’s Detroit?
The north-east of England: Britain's Detroit?
Once a New Labour heartland, Tory cuts have left the north-east
teetering on the brink. Can it avoid becoming Britain's Detroit? As the
era of shiny new galleries and economic swagger recedes, Andy
Beckett finds out
The Guardian, Saturday 10 May 2014
The Awards (known then as the Leo’s due to the English lion trophy that people won!) were established 25 years ago by the ETB as a project to improve the perceptions of the English tourism experience, which still suffered from a poor understanding of the breadth and wealth of the experience offered. And in particular crass broad brush views and negative comparisons with the offer found in sun-drenched Mediterranean countries. Re-runs of Faulty Towers never help much either.
These days our potential visitors are better informed – thanks must go to our media, who increasingly delight in uncovering hidden gems and exclusive insights. The north-east has certainly benefitted from their interest, and of course – you have the product to satisfy them.
The Awards these days serve a much broader remit for VisitEngland as the national tourist board. 25 years on, through several reorganisations and funding cuts, the Awards continue to be a core part of our work plan. As you do, each year when we set our budgets we consider very carefully our expenditure and the return on that investment. And we continue to believe that the Awards fulfil a much needed communications role and have the potential to deliver beyond that.
As with everything in life, what you get out depends on what you put in.
In running these Awards we are providing you with a platform to publicise yourselves, to motivate your staff and in doing so hopefully increase your profile and your business. 18 official destinations in England feed finalists through to the Nationals and in addition, where no local awards are offered, we take direct entries. We had just short of 400 entries this year – so the five finalist have truly achieved a fantastic result. When our Chairman says “you are all winners”, she knows what she’s talking about and means it.
The judging process is rigouress and completely independent of VE. We employ assessors who then report into an independent judging panel – VE simply picks of the bill and make the tea whilst the judges deliberate…. It’s true to say that those who come via the destination filter are often a better standard of entry, having been supported in the process by their destination manager so I’m delighted to be here today at the launch of NGI’s awards cycle.
There are a lot of categories, we try to be comprehensive, and we may look to refresh in the coming years based on your feedback.
The winners provide us with a base of case studies and examples of best practice which we draw on during the year. This slide show last year’s winners of the Access category, a publication we produced for distribution to targeted organisations who could then inform their membership and to consumers at specific exhibitions, such MS Life, the Multiple Sclerosis Society’s biennial event held earlier this year in Manchester. Our reason for attending was to promote accessible holidays in England and we were accompanied by Blackpool’s Sandcastle Waterpark (the Gold Winner of the VisitEngland Award for Excellence 2013 Access for All Award) as well as Visit Bath.
Mini guides to Accessible Leicestershire, Brighton, Bath and NewcastleGateshead (all part of our regional growth funded Access campaign) and the Access for All Award Winners Brochure were distributed to visitors, as well as information on our National Accessible Scheme (NAS), giving disabled people peace of mind when booking accommodation in England.
The event attracted around 3,000 people affected by multiple sclerosis and I’m reliably informed that visitors were using this brochure there and then to place bookings with the featured business.
The Reasons to be Green brochure did a similar job when we produced this as part of a push for sustainable tourism a couple of years ago.
Our winners are, of course, top of mind when our media team is considering requests from journalists and others looking for introductions to the best that England offers and we mine this information in the year following the Awards and beyond.
Increasingly we’re finding that some businesses are using the awards format as a product development tool as you can see from this feedback we received from Wheatland Farm Eco Lodges, the gold winner of the Sustainable Tourism category last year.
All our finalists provide us with a base of case studies which we mine during the following year and beyond.
This is the double page spread which will appear in the June edition of Travel GBI and includes all finalists.
Here’s our Chairman and Noel Josephides, the Chairman of ABTA, receiving the Outstanding Contribution to Tourism on behalf of the UK Travel Agent, who like our media, have become good friends and allies in our quest to champion the English tourism experience.
The venue for 2015 is yet to be decided. We take the event around the country as we view it as a fantastic opportunity to showcase the destination to the media and also to the other finalists.
So can I wish you Good Luck etc etc.
