WELSH HERITAGE TOURISM FOR A NEW POST COLONIAL WALES

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According to an article which appeared in the Western Mail on Monday (15th March 2010) this week sees the launching of 'British Tourism Week' and, it seems, that the Welsh Assembly Government and Visit Wales are pinning their hopes for a substantial increase in Welsh Tourism on the Autumn's Ryder Cup which is to take place at the Celtic Manor in Newport and excellent as the promotional brochures may be for this event, is it really going to deliver and place Wales firmly on the world tourist trail? Of course not, only a clear inspirational and recognizable 'national' brand can do that and, it seems, that Visit Wales are still failing dismally in their endeavours to find this challenging 'national' brand. Shortly, I will be writing an article presenting my percieved strategy for the branding and marketing of Wales and Welsh tourism but in the meantime, the chosen few that have recieved a link to enable them to read this post may wish to visit the further link below which will open a pdf file of my MBA in Tourism Management dissertation entitled 'Welsh Heritage Tourism for a New Post Colonial Wales' which deals with reasons why Visit Wales are failing to effectivelly brand Welsh Tourism. link below will open

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https://acrobat.com/#d=ENWhE3c5t*WFPXAuePIylw

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S.Ifan (MBA Tourism Management)

My views on the Western Mail article 'Experts call for Wales to promote its image abroad

The report below appeared in the Western Mail on the 20th November and, out of sheer despair, i felt the need to reply. My reply was printed, in part, on the 3rd of December but, as important points (in my view) had been edited out of my reply by the Western Mail, I think it is important for me to place the report in question along with my full reply here on this Wales Tourism Watch blog so that those interested in the issue concerned may view both items in full.
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Report:
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Experts call for Wales to promote its image abroad
Nov 20 2009 by Clare Hutchinson, Western Mail
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WALES should take a leaf out of Ireland’s book and make more of its cultural identity, a group of experts from some of the country’s top institutions said yesterday.
Experts from the National Museum of Wales, Arts Council of Wales, Welsh National Opera, Welsh Language Board and National Eisteddfod met with representatives from the Assembly Government and Visit Wales to discuss how to market the nation to the rest of the world.
They concluded that while Wales’ cultural assets were as strong as those found across the Irish Sea, our global standing was far weaker.
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National Museum of Wales director general Michael Houlihan said: “Wales has a job to do on an international front. If you go to the States the Irish diaspora is very strong, whereas for Wales there is still a lot of work to be done.
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“I have worked in Northern Ireland and am aware of how well they work to promote themselves as a tourist destination. We have also got some fantastic stories to tell.
“If you go back to the origins of the museum in the 1920s it was formed to show Wales to the world and show the world to Wales, and in a sense we are trying to pick up on that ‘showing Wales to the world’ element.
“We are in the business of preserving and nourishing identity.
“There is a real danger in the recession that we might think that it’s not worth worrying about culture, but it is incredibly important to our country and our economy.”
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Heledd Fychan, advocacy and policy officer at the National Museum of Wales, added: “The recession has been really good at forcing us to think of culture in economic terms and think of definitive marketable Welsh icons.
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“We are still very unclear how to market ourselves. The Irish market their music, their castles and art collections brilliantly – even though they are not as good as ours. Our identity and our language is stronger but as a sector we have not made a concerted effort to really push ourselves on these strengths.”
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But John Wake, a director of Capital Region Tourism, branded the idea of following in Ireland’s footsteps “unrealistic”.
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He said: “What Ireland have got is a happy-go-lucky attitude to life. The culture is drinking, smiling, being one of the lads or one of the girls. I don’t think we could copy that. We have our own identity that is very different. To compare us with Ireland is unrealistic.
“Ireland has Guinness, pubs and leprechauns and we don’t have any of that. What is the biggest parade of the year in New York? St Patrick’s Day. In Wales we celebrate St Patrick’s Day and Burns Night more than St David’s Day. Why don’t we have a Dylan Thomas night?
“Take King Arthur, that is a Welsh legend. So what do we do about it? Nothing.
“The national institutions are right to say we need to do something, but it is the people that make the culture and we have got to get the people of Wales on board.
“What we have got is a smaller, compact country but one with amazing diversity – the differences between north, south, east and west are unbelievable and that is something we need to show to the world.”
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A spokeswoman for the Arts Council of Wales said: “The purpose of these meetings are to see how we can collaborate to build upon the Wales cultural tourism brand and work together in a more cohesive way so we can emphasise the broad sweep of attractions Wales has to offer the visitor.
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“With employment in the creative industries growing by 9% over the last two years, it is more than fanciful to say that it might just be our creative businesses that help lead Wales out of recession.”
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A spokesperson for Visit Wales said: “Our goal is to create a distinctive, appealing image for Wales as a tourist destination. We’re working with the tourism industry to ensure that visitors to Wales experience our country and its people at its best.”
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Now, my View on the above as sent in letter form to the Western Mail:
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Sir,
The article entitled ‘Experts call for Wales to promote its image abroad’ which appeared in the W.M. on 20/11/09 revealed that Visit Wales is still failing to fully market our nation to the rest of the world. I, for one, would like to know how many more meetings and junkets followed by the commissioning of expensive consultancy reports will it take before Visit Wales are confident enough to accept and tackle the reality that what the world expect to experience when visiting our nation are those elements which makes a visit 'unique' and different to other worldwide locations visited. Yes, we are blessed with areas of beautiful and breathtaking scenery but so is every other country on the tourism trail. Likewise, all of the usual ‘niche’ and outdoor tourism markets that are catered for in Wales can also be accessed in other countries that, more than often, have a better climate than us and although Visit Wales has pulled out all the stops to do a tremendous job in regards to the promotion of the Ryder Cup which is to take place at the Celtic Manor in Newport next year, that event will come and go and Wales will once again be in competition with bigger and better world wide golf tourism.
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The named “experts” in the aforementioned article agreed that the ‘unique’ elements that we do have in Wales which can be utilized for tourism is our history and culture and, only recently, the Welsh Assembly Government, through its Minister of Heritage, committed itself to a new Heritage Tourism Strategy and Cadw has been allocated the responsibility for the administration of an ambitious Euro funded Heritage Tourism project. Cadw also, in conjunction with the Welsh Arts Council is coordinating the Welsh effort for the Cultural Olympiad programme and the project, launched at Harlech earlier in the year, has adopted elements of ‘The Mabinogion’ one of the most important books in Welsh and worldwide literature as its main theme.
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Despite my reservations concerning some areas associated with the aforementioned projects, on the whole, I believe that they have provided Wales with the best foundations for heritage tourism to date and I would suggest that Visit Wales would do well to revive their previous branding and marketing strategy of ‘Wales Land of Legend’ as, both, a means of contributing to the foundations laid down by the Minister of Heritage and Cadw and as a sure proof solution to their problem of the branding and marketing of Wales on an international level.
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To conclude, I would suggest that we should forget Arthur as a tourism asset for Wales as the Anglo American market, have, for a long time, had him well and truly packaged to serve their national interests. Our most important ‘national’ heroic figure is undoubtedly Owain Glyndŵr, an enigmatic charismatic figure that ticks all the boxes of all that should be incorporated in the proposed revived strategy of ‘Wales Land of Legend’. What a great opportunity and coup it would be for Wales tourism and the Welsh nation if by 2014, the 660 anniversary of this great historical figure’s birth, a blockbusting film was released about him and his War for Welsh independence. What a great opportunity for the Welsh Assembly Government and Visit Wales to initiate a promotional ‘Hiraeth’ campaign and a homecoming of Welsh exiles to, hopefully, visit a new ‘post referendum’ 2011 Wales, a Wales with a Parliament such as Glyndŵr and the people of 15th century Wales had dreamed of and had fought so hard to achieve.
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I would suggest that if the Welsh Assembly Government and Visit Wales are serious about ‘nation building’ then, rather than squander more money on expensive consultancy reports that lead nowhere, they should consult with major players in the film world to produce the big Owain Glyndŵr film. Think about it, films such as ‘The Bruce’ and ‘Braveheart’ have bought Scottish exiles flocking home in their 1000’s.
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Siân Ifan

INTRODUCTION.