PROMOTING TOURISM


efforts must be commensurate in some general way.


Our traditional market area is well served by the airlines and the cruise ships. Leave that area, and travel to Bermuda becomes more than just nipping out to the nearest airport and hopping on a plane. There's another variable – the


extent to which you put effort into marketing to people who live in what might be described as secondary markets. Yet another is the extent to which you try to persuade airlines to start servicing Bermuda from cities beyond our core markets. This is tricky because airlines like to be sure before they start a service that it's going to fill seats. There are four main groups involved in selling Bermuda as a holiday destination. Airlines and cruise ship companies promote their services to get people to the country. Hotels promote themselves as good places for regular visitors to use, and the Bermuda Government promotes Bermuda as an ideal holiday destination. However, there is another variable, because the mix – the extent to which each of these groups is involved in promotional efforts – can be less or it can be more. The extent to which these efforts spill over into each other (cooperative government/hotels promotional efforts) can vary quite a bit.


Another key variable in this business involves choosing the demographics of the people you sell to. It’s a matter of fine judgement, figuring out who they are and keeping track of their changing tastes. Broadly speaking, there's no point in putting a lot of effort into trying to attract only the rich because there simply aren't enough of them. There's no point in trying to attract people who earn minimum wage because we need customers with enough disposable dollars to enjoy a Bermuda vacation. This isn't to cast aspersions at any group it's just


trying to figure out who makes the best match in terms of our two sets of needs.


It is important that we target people who will appreciate the Bermuda experience; those who will come again and tell their friends and relatives about the good time they had and those who will spend their hard-earned money here. It is important that all of these efforts are well coordinated, so that different people aren't telling different stories, and so that advertising and promotional efforts are carefully aimed at the kind of people Bermuda wants to visit her shores.


Another variable is what tourism-related facilities you offer to your visitors when they get here. Budget conscious cruise ship visitors need to be able to buy the kind of souvenirs they want. Regular visitors with more in their pockets need to be able to buy the things they like. Similarly, you need to ensure that restaurants and nightclubs and bars that will satisfy both types of people are in place. You can see that nothing in this business is cast in stone. Almost every aspect of the business of tourism is capable of being adjusted. The type of tourist you're after, how you try to attract them, what kind of experience you offer once they get here – decisions about these things are the responsibility of the Minister of Tourism, his civil service team and of those from the industry who are involved in the running of tourism. It is no secret that tourism in Bermuda is deeply challenged. To a large extent, this is the result of forces outside Bermuda – the changing tastes and habits of the traveller generally, the recession, intense competition and so on. But we must also bear some of the responsibility ourselves. In Bermuda some years ago, rising costs and falling profit margins began to put world-class nightclub entertainment beyond our reach. At the same time, we suffered growing political anxiety


6 | The Parliamentarian | 2009: Issue One - Bermuda


about protecting our own entertainers. The combination of these two factors has given rise to complaints that we are unable to offer a good choice of night-time entertainment to our guests. Rising prices mean that


everybody is feeling the pinch – the visitors themselves, hoteliers, restaurateurs, shopkeepers and taxi drivers. Even the local man in the street, who once might have been prepared to take time to help visitors he met during his day (and helped make our reputation as a friendly place to visit) leads a more frenetic life than once he did, and just can't afford to take the time to do that very anymore. So it has


We believe Bermuda tourism can be improved, but not until we return to


principles that worked well from previous decades.


become harder to give visitors the value for money we once did.


The political component My party – the United Bermuda Party – is Her Majesty's loyal opposition. We were in power during the island’s successful periods of tourism and we helped build the industry. Toward the end of our time in government, we concluded the need to inject a greater level of expertise and accountability into the management of the industry. Our plan was to set up a Tourism Authority which would have the authority to manage and grow the industry – staffed by hospitality professionals who would set business targets and who would be held accountable for meeting them. We continue to believe a Tourism Authority is the right way


forward – a lean, professional, business-driven organization, free of political decision-making, and charged with the goal of making Bermuda more competitive as a tourist destination. The government has yet to make a decision for a Tourism Authority, but given the industry’s poor performance over the past decade and our diminishing presence in core markets, maybe it’s time to adopt such new initiatives. We believe Bermuda tourism can be improved, but not until we return to principles that worked well from previous decades. On the other hand, to address the second topic mentioned in this article, we do not believe that Bermuda will ever again become the agriculture-exporting country we were nearly a century ago, of the sweet Bermuda onion, for example, or Bermuda tobacco, given that we don’t really have the land. Real estate is as expensive here as it is in Hong Kong, or in any first-class residential area in the world. The high cost of labour is another problem for us – indeed, Bermudians have no appetite at all for working as farmhands, and that category of labour is largely imported, adding another layer of cost. The raw materials of farming – seeds, fertiliser and tools – must all be imported. In view of this, you can see there is no chance at all that our agricultural produce might compete in world markets. Local farming diminished in the 20th Century, until one man showed us that there is a local demand for good, organic, well-grown vegetables. His farm has since thrived and others are following his lead. We believe every effort must be made to preserve and enhance agriculture. We believe that all existing arable land – some 3,000 acres, I believe – ought to be preserved at all costs, even if it is not currently being used. Not only might we be saving it for future use, but green land in a crowded country like ours is like water to a man dying of thirst.


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