New Tourism Industry Awards announced

Tourism Industry Association chief executive Chris Roberts. PHOTO/ SUPPLIED

A new and expanded New Zealand Tourism Industry Awards was launched today to recognise those individuals, businesses and organisations helping one of the country's largest industries almost double annual revenue to $41 billion by 2025.

The reinvigorated awards programme has been scaled up from just the two or three awards that have been presented over the past five years to include nine business and industry awards, and three individual awards.

The awards are an initiative of the Tourism Industry Association New Zealand (TIA) and the announcement was made today at Trenz, the country's premium tourism trade show, which is managed by Tourism Industry Association.

"These awards will set a benchmark of excellence and celebrate success in New Zealand's $24 billion tourism industry - an industry that has been showing strong and sustained growth over the past 18 months after several very challenging years," Tourism Industry Awards chief executive Chris Roberts said.

"We have closely aligned the new awards programme with the industry's Tourism 2025 growth framework which aspires to almost double annual tourism revenue to $41 billion in the next decade and highlights the importance of delivering an outstanding visitor experience.

"The industry won't achieve this goal unless we lift our performance and awards are one way we can do that. Benchmarking against the very best operators enables businesses to assess and improve their own performance, which in turn will help improve the industry's overall productivity."

Mr Roberts says the new awards are for businesses of all sizes, from SMEs to large corporates, and from all sectors across the diverse industry.

"Being the best includes many measures, amongst them financial success, innovation, leadership and sustainability, which are inherent in any successful business, regardless of size.

"We also have an award for organisations that are enabling the tourism industry to turbo charge its growth, such as a government agency whose work is boosting tourism's performance, for example by improving the visitor experience or removing regulatory barriers," Mr Roberts said.

Entries for the 2015 New Zealand Tourism Industry Awards open on 1 June. The winners will be announced at a dinner in Auckland on 2 October. For more information including the criteria and application details visit the Tourism Industry Awards website www.tourismawards.co.nz.

Award Categories
Individual Awards
• Three individual awards recognise tourism professionals at three different levels of career progression:
• Emerging Tourism Leader
• Tourism Industry Champion
• Sir Jack Newman Award (outstanding industry leader)

Business and Industry Categories
Eight awards recognise business and industry success:
• Visitor Experience Award
• Business Excellence Award - annual turnover less than $6 million
• Business Excellence Award - annual turnover more than $6 million
• Industry Alignment Award
• Tourism 2025 Enabler Award
• Environmental Tourism Award
• Cultural Tourism Award
• Marketing Campaign Award

Supreme Tourism Industry Award
The Supreme Tourism Industry Award winner will be selected from the eight Business and Industry Award winners.