Tourist hordes loving New Zealand to death

By CHRIS BARTON

On Central Otago they come for the Rail Trail - a three-day cycling trip that follows the old Otago Central Branch railway line from Middlemarch to Clyde.

From Christchurch they travel by minibus to Arthur's Pass National Park and walk with a guide to an overnight camp in a glacial valley.

From Taupo they drive to the Wairakei Terraces to be welcomed on to a marae for hongi, hangi and haka.

In tourismspeak they're known as "the interactive traveller" and they're the key to New Zealand's multi-billion-dollar boom industry - an industry that despite September 11 and Sars is now bigger than the dairy sector and one that contributed $7.4 billion in earnings from just over two million overseas visitors in the year ending March 2003.

That year, total tourism expenditure - including domestic travel and GST - was $16.5 billion, 5.8 per cent up on the previous year. It's a boom that shows no signs of abating, with visitor numbers for this year (ending April) up 6.2 per cent to almost 2.2 million.

As one travel operator put it: "The stars are all lined up incredibly at the moment."

But the influx brings problems, too - swamping some areas and threatening to spoil the party. For 10 days in February there were no spare rental cars in the South Island and overcrowding at peak times in places such as Queenstown, Kaikoura and the South Island's West Coast is straining accommodation and infrastructure.

There are worries also that the special character of places is being ruined by ugly motel strip developments and that congestion and high prices are making it increasingly difficult for New Zealanders themselves to enjoy their traditional summer holiday.

There are even suggestions that to cope with the peak we should change the timing of our school holidays.

On the flipside, small communities are realising that if they're handled right, interactive travellers can bring huge benefits in terms of money, jobs and economic stability to the regions.

But who is this foreign creature, what interactions do they want, and why do we want them?

"Most of them are looking for the scenic beauty - that's No 1," says Mike McClelland, whose Californian company The Best of New Zealand Fly Fishing organises individual fishing itineraries starting at about $20,000.

Most of his clients use the front of the plane and stay in upmarket lodges, vineyard cottages, or luxury B&Bs. "When we get our trip reports, the one thing that comes back from our clients time after time is the friendly Kiwi host. They enjoy the people and the friendliness and the helpfulness of the Kiwi - that's the big difference about New Zealand," McClelland says.

Tourism New Zealand chairman Wally Stone says interactive travellers are the best type of visitor because they go out into the regions, stay longer and spend more money.

"They want a Kiwi holiday - the very things we love most about this country is what they want to experience. It seems obvious to me that's the type of visitor we want - people who value the same things we value. On that basis we know that we can deliver it because it's real," Stone says.

One Night Outdoors guide Bill Trolove gives his clients a taste of Kiwi camping and finds that most who take his walk to Avalanche Peak underneath the spectacular Crow Glacier and the south face of Mount Rolleston have never spent a night in a tent before.

Some find the wilderness and wide open spaces almost too daunting. A group of Singaporeans were surprised Trolove hadn't sent someone ahead to sweep Canadian Goose droppings off the track. He gets around such cultural clashes by making sure there are plenty of photo opportunities and by handing out certificates of achievement at the end of the trip.

"I'm quite proud of the country and really I just want to show it off to people. When I say goodbye to people they're usually pretty buggered at the end of it because it's two days and some of it pretty tough, but they've enjoyed it. We do leave as friends," Trolove says.

Tourism Industry Association chief executive John Moriarty points out that most interactive travellers are not the super-rich. "Mr and Mrs Average from Japan, Europe or the United States are often twice as wealthy as the average New Zealander because of their higher standard of living and the exchange rate."

But if the interactive are the desired visitors, by far the biggest tourist group coming to our shores are Australians - 760,775 for the year ending in April, up 16.7 per cent on the previous year.

Some of those fit the interactive category, but most are coming - helped by increased capacity and competitive pricing on the Tasman route - for short stays. That has some benefits. "It costs a lot of money to give rich Americans or Europeans a good time," Moriarty says. "It doesn't cost a lot of money to give Australians a good time."

The Aussie invasion also provides regular year-round visitors and a strong backbone to our winter season. But it can lead to bottlenecks. At the Trenz tourism conference in June, Len Murray, general manager of Australian company Value Tours, said accommodation shortages in some areas during the peak summer season were making it difficult to put together itineraries.

Industry consensus is to accept the peaks but stop accommodating more visitors. By not increasing peak numbers, visitors should soon realise they need to book ahead and will push their travel plans out into the "shoulder" season. "There will be times when we've got to be prepared in New Zealand to say, 'this week we're full'," says Minister of Tourism Mark Burton.

Suppressing the peak by allowing demand to exceed capacity puts less pressure on facilities and extends the season into spring and autumn. That in turn creates long-term employment prospects. Sounds good in theory, but in practice developers continue to build more accommodation in places such as Queenstown and Wanaka.

Stone says it is an issue of maturity that involves fighting the instinct to make a quick buck.

"That's the enemy of our industry. We adopt short-term gains for long-term losses. It challenges us about whether we're better to have our rooms at 70 to 80 per cent occupancy for 12 months of the year or at 80 to 90 per cent for three months and 30 per cent for the rest of the year."

Burton says the summer peak involves dealing with the fact that New Zealand is on holiday as well. "It's about the distribution of people across the calendar as well as the landscape."

That brings suggestions to stagger the domestic season. "It may involve moving our school holidays if New Zealand wants to do well in this," says Moriarty - a suggestion unlikely to sit well with New Zealanders who fervently believe, rightly so, that the summer belongs to them.

Stone says the school holiday issue highlights how important it is to make sure tourism is relevant to and valued by the general population. "They have to benefit from the growth and performance of the tourism industry." It is also important, he says, to find ways of pricing the increasingly expensive visitor experience so that the domestic market isn't excluded. So far there's a lot of talk but little action.

Meanwhile, more visitors keep coming - largely attributable to the success of tourism's "100 per cent pure New Zealand" marketing campaign launched in 1999, which takes leverage off big events such as the America's Cup and the Lord of the Rings.

"Those events give us access to the media and through the media we're able to communicate a New Zealand destination," Stone says.

Behind the campaign is a strategy targeting interactive travellers and giving them destination information through a single web portal - newzealand.com - which the Government bought for about $1 million early last year. At that time, Act MP Rodney Hide criticised the deal as crazy, saying: "That's the sort of dopiness that should have died out with the dot com crash."

Despite the criticism and other shenanigans - accusations that the Government tried to take the domain name illegally - the portal is proving its worth as a tourist guide to New Zealand and as a central rallying point for tourist operators and accommodation providers.

"All of that has to be underpinned by the most powerful marketing tool in the world - word of mouth," Stone says. "That is, people leave New Zealand with no regrets."

The key ingredient to ensure tourist satisfaction remains high is the Qualmark star ratings of accommodation and Qualmark endorsements of tours, activities and attractions. "It's a commitment to quality assurance - our way of trying to separate the cowboys from those who are totally committed to the industry and committed to its long-term future."

A further measure of the strategy's success is seen in other countries - Canada is an example - copying the single-message approach.

New Zealand is also up against Australia's renewed efforts and a A$360 million global marketing campaign aimed at snaring its own interactive travellers.

Stone remains optimistic that New Zealand can continue to punch above its weight and use its small size to advantage, particularly in the ability to co-operate nationally towards the goal.

The strategy is carried to the country through regional tourism organisations such as Go Wairarapa and Tourism Eastland - at times with a bit of tension.

"We want to accurately promote what we've got and attract those who are interested in that," says Tourism Central Otago manager Kirsty Rusher.

"People then come here and find it's different - sometimes there's disappointment, sometimes surprise and delight."

She says interactive tourists - "people interested in doing more than just looking out the window" - have been coming to the region all along. As one of the smaller regional organisations, Central Otago's $200,000 annual budget - plus $300,000 to run its visitor centres - struggles to compete with million-dollar marketing and big events such as Queenstown's Winter Festival.

The need for consultation and bringing the community along with the vision is also evident at Kaikoura, the home of Whale Watch, where extensive development plans for the peninsula are going through resource consent. The project developers need designation of the peninsula as a tourism zone and have taken two years - including 120 presentations and open days - to get sign-off from the community.

Wairakei Terraces tourism manager Raewyn Hill says her company gets good support from Destination Lake Taupo, the Poutama Maori Business Trust and the New Zealand Maori Tourism Society. The geothermal attraction is combined with a "Maori cultural experience".

Five years ago, Hill says, no one could identify what Maori tourism was - except for international visitors who saw it as a traditional concert and hangi.

"It's more than that now - a Maori tourism product can be whitewater rafting, horse trekking or a guided walk. The component that makes them different is the ability to tell the stories that relate to where they are - about the culture specific to the area, the legends and the history of Maori and New Zealand."

Hill is encouraged by the recognition Maori tourism is getting - most recently with the publication of the The Rough Guide to Maori New Zealand - but is disappointed that the renaissance isn't more directly recognised on newzealand.com.

On the site, matters Maori are found under the "arts, culture and heritage" activities category and the sub-category "cultural attraction". Wairakei Terraces is found under "scenic highlights-volcanic/geothermal" which somewhat undersells the Maori component.

Interestingly, about 80 per cent of those taking the cultural experience are New Zealanders. But as marketing to Europeans - in particular, Germans, who apparently can't get enough of the culture - takes hold, Wairakei is expecting more interactive travellers.

Barring some unforeseen terrorist threat, disease epidemic or drop in consumer confidence, it's a fair bet that not just Wairakei but all New Zealand is going to get them - in droves. As the interactive horde grows, the question yet to be played out is: Will Kiwis continue to welcome them?


* Email Chris Barton