Fair trade show?

Every year in January, I spend a couple of days in Vienna. Not for my own pleasure, but to work at the fair “Ferienmesse Wien”. I present our holiday destination Attergau as good as I can, distributing pamphlets hoping that I inspire the fair visitor for a stay in the Attergau. Thousands of people are visiting the travel exhibition every year and it is part of our marketing strategy, hypothetical spoken... 

Looking back makes me gonna reconsider: is a fair really the right place to attract new guests for my very lovely destination? Truth is that the travel exhibition is next to Dr. Oetker muffins, wine stations and cooking shows not the main attraction any more. Most of the people are looking out for free give aways and competitions. 

Do not get me wrong: Visitors are interested in our destination and keep asking for further information, but they already used to spend a holiday in our destination, have friends there or they grew up in this place and want to gossip. It is a fact that less than 1% is making their holiday decision due to a fair visit.  So going to a fair is the right medium to keep in touch with your returning guests, but get rid of the illusion of new guests coming to your resort. At least in Vienna.

Petra Gangl

Tourismusverband Attergau

RELAXATION FROM NATURE, SAUNA AND POOLS

Finland is a sparsely populated country with 5.5 million inhabitants. Around 65 per cent of Finland's total land area is covered by forest and 10 per cent by lakes. The on-going WelDest consumer research in Finland has got 2,177 respondents so far. Almost 80% of the respondents are female aged between 40 and 60 years.

According to preliminary results, the most important factors which influenced the latest choice of a health and well-being destination of the Finnish respondents were in order of importance: possibility to relax, opportunities for outdoor and indoor sport activities, spa treatments available, nature, and nice scenery. Sauna and pool offerings are also highly valued.  When choosing a health and well-being destination, the Finns seem to rely on their earlier positive experiences in a destination. The Internet is the second most important source affecting the choice of a health and well-being destination.

The Finns seem to take nature almost for granted. The WelDest survey in Finland didn’t have any foreign respondents, but according to earlier tourism surveys conducted for foreign tourists in Finland, nature is the most important pull factor of the country. Forests seem to be an immense source of health, which could be productised to larger extent in Finland. According to research carried out in Finland, Japan and the Netherlands, e.g. green surroundings, silence of the forest, hiking and other activities in the nature have several positive effects on health including recovering from stress, positive effects on blood pressure, pulse rate as well as immune functions.

If you want to dig deeper in the preventive health-related effects of nature and forest, you can read the scientific article Nature Therapy and Preventive Medicine  (link)