Glasgow City Marketing Bureau Delivers Real Economic Benefit in 2007/2008

Glasgow City Marketing Bureau continues to prove its worth in delivering real economic benefit for the Metropolitan Glasgow area through its effectiveness in forming strategic alliances with key stakeholders in the private and public sectors. 

 

GCMB’s structure allows it to deliver on the city’s aspirations and the organisation has a team of 43 people engaged in event creation, management and marketing; conference, meetings and incentive sales; convention and event accommodation bookings; public relations, ICT and corporate planning.

 

It is also the custodian of the Glasgow: Scotland with style brand, which is now woven into Glasgow’s new economic strategy for the next ten years and the city’s tourism strategy until 2016.   

 

Since the brand’s launch in March 04, average hotel occupancy has increased from 70.7 per cent to 77.1 per cent - despite a growth in accommodation provision in the city over the same period.  

 

GCMB Chair, Councillor Steven Purcell, said: “I am tremendously proud of the work undertaken by Glasgow City Marketing Bureau over the last year.

 

“The results clearly demonstrate the viability of having a destination marketing agency dedicated solely to promoting Glasgow and which undoubtedly gives the city a distinct competitive advantage in the face of current global economic trends.”

 

Key highlights from 2007-2008 include:

 

Average hotel occupancy¹ levels stood at 77.1 per cent compared to 75.3 per cent for March 06 - end March 07 while average room rate² was up by 3.4 per cent and room yield² up by 4.1 per cent to end of February 08.

There are 2,400 new hotel rooms planned for Glasgow in the next three years to meet demand from the city’s booming conference, events and leisure travel markets.

 

*Events secured by GCMB resulted in £16.3 million in local economic benefit representing an increase of £12.1 million over the previous year and equating to a return on investment (ROI) of 1:28.  Event attendances rose from 252,160 in 2006/07 to 435,062 in 2007/08 and unique visitors at events were up from 149,892 to 289,550 during the same period.  (*excluding the Uefa Cup Final in May 07)

 

Glasgow’s hosting of the Uefa Cup Final meanwhile saw £11.5 million of net economic benefit for the metropolitan area representing an ROI of 1:23 on the city’s contribution of £500,000, which was managed by GCMB.

 

The average spend per trip per person was £411 and £219 for finalist supporters and neutral fans respectively – well above average tourism expenditure levels.

 

It is further anticipated that the local economy will continue to benefit from the 2007 Uefa Cup Final in future years with 55 per cent and 75 per cent of all fans likely or very likely to visit Glasgow and Scotland respectively in the next three years.

 

GCMB’s Convention Bureau secured £151 million in conference sales, which represented a 3 per cent increase over 2006/07 and equated to 543,000 delegate days and an 11 per cent increase over the previous year.

 

The Glasgow Conference Ambassador Programme accounted for £35 million of all conference business secured in 2007/08.  This influential network, which is managed by GCMB, has in excess of 2,000 members drawn from the local academic scientific, medical and business communities. 

 

The Programme provides a high level of support to these key individuals to enable them to persuade their own associations to meet in the city.

 

GCMB broke new technological ground in January 08 by becoming the only convention bureau in the UK to take part in the cutting-edge Virtual Meeting World, the first ever trade show for the meetings industry to be held in cyber space.

 

February 08 meanwhile saw Glasgow City Marketing Bureau named the UK’s best convention bureau for the second year running in the prestigious Meetings and Incentive Travel magazine awards.  In a night of double triumph for the city, the Scottish Exhibition + Conference Centre (SECC) was also named best UK conference centre.

 

Brand research undertaken for GCMB by TNS in November 2007 has revealed that perceptions of Glasgow among the UK ‘style set’ have significantly improved over the last two years. The research, devised to track the effectiveness of Glasgow: Scotland with style, shows that there has been a 13 per cent swing in Glasgow’s favour among what the marketing industry terms ‘UK early style adopters’.

 

GCMB continued to work with both Glasgow and Prestwick airports on route development throughout 2007/08.  In the last year Glasgow International has secured flights from a number of destinations including Berlin, Paris, La Rochelle, Orlando, Vancouver, Toronto and Pakistan.  Glasgow Prestwick has recently welcomed flights from Budapest, Belfast, Cork, Reus, Riga, Katowice, Poznan, Wroclaw, Grenoble, Derry, Warsaw, Kaunas and Gdansk.

 

In autumn 2007 GCMB, Glasgow City Council, Glasgow Chamber of Commerce and Scottish Enterprise Glasgow joined forces with leading retailers the St. Enoch Centre, Buchanan Galleries, John Lewis and Frasers Glasgow to deliver the Christmas wrapped up campaign. 

 

Key objectives were to promote city centre attractions, events and shopping in Glasgow during the crucial festive trading period and intensive activity across West Central Scotland ensured Christmas wrapped up reached 2.87 million television viewers; 1.24 million radio listeners and 600,000 newspaper readers. 

 

The online campaign resulted in 2.5 million page views while 1.6 million a week were reached by the outdoor activity.

 

The city’s new online shopping guide at www.seeglasgow.com was launched during the campaign and continues to provide an invaluable ‘insider’s guide’ to all that’s new and exciting about the retail scene.  The online guide is regularly updated by GCMB to ensure it has the very latest information on everything from store openings to fashion shows and other events.

 

GCMB’s public relations team hosted a total of 108 print and broadcast media during 2007/08 and activity resulted in key messages being communicated to a global audience in excess of 490 million people and more than £66 million in equivalent coverage*.
(*excluding Uefa Cup Final)

 

Separate analyses of television and press coverage carried out by Uefa and Media Measurement Ltd meanwhile reported that 19 million viewers and almost 26 million newspaper readers saw coverage of the Cup Final across the UK and Europe.  The equivalent advertising value of the print coverage achieved is estimated at being in excess of £1 million.

 

An audience in excess of 53 million is estimated to have seen coverage of key messages relating to the Glasgow: Scotland with style Design Collective’s appearance at London Fashion Week in September 07 and the Scottish Government’s involvement with the project.

 

This equated to almost £667k in equivalent advertising and represented an overall ROI of 9.5:1 on the total project cost of £70k.  (£40k - GCMB, £30k - Scottish Government).

 

The reception on Monday, September 17 in The British Fashion Council Catwalk Tent was attended by circa 150 style media, buyers, corporate clients, designers and other key influencers.

 

News of the Clipper 07-08 Round-the-World yacht race, in which the Glasgow: Scotland with style is participating, has been watched to date by a global audience of 328.1 million, which equates to £29.8 million in ad equivalence. 

 

1.9 million visitors accessed www.seeglasgow.com representing a 38 per cent increase year-on-year and resulted in 17.8 million page views (51 per cent increase year-on-year).

 

In addition the bespoke microsite www.seeglasgow.com/uefa created by GCMB attracted 90,000 unique visitors, which equated to 600,000 page views.

 

Going forwards, Glasgow’s Tourism Strategy sets out a clear direction for the city’s tourism industry that will bring an expected four million visitors a year to Glasgow by 2016.  With global tourism expected to grow at 4% a year, this would mean the sector would generate £1 billion in annual revenue for the city.

 

For further information, or to arrange an interview with GCMB CEO Scott Taylor, please contact:

 

Moira Dyer, Senior Manager – Public Relations
Glasgow City Marketing Bureau
Tel:  0044 (0) 141 566 0831
Email: moira.dyer@seeglasgow.com

 

Note to editors:
Sources
1. Lynn Jones Forecaster to end March 08
2 PKF to end February 08