St Helens hails tourism coup

Sep 11 2007 by Larry Neild, Liverpool Daily Post

St Helens hails tourism coup

ONE of Britain’s most prestigious tourism conferences is to take place next summer in St Helens, attracting hundreds of holiday professionals to the town.

The Tourism Society will stage its annual conference between June 19 and June 20, with the main theme Emerging Markets in Tourism.

The Tourism Society is the leading membership organisation for tourism professionals, with over 1,000 members in the UK and overseas.

It holds its annual conference in a different destination every year, with previous host locations including Aviemore (Scotland), Nottingham, Liverpool, and Greenwich (London). The conference, supported by St Helens Council, will feature a number of keynote speakers from the tourism industry, government, and public sector bodies.

The Emerging Markets in Tourism theme will cover topics such as business tourism (conferences & exhibitions), sports tourism, gay tourism and cultural tourism.

Dickon White, chairman of the St Helens Tourism Business Network and managing director of Haydock Park Racecourse said: “It is a great coup for St Helens that the Tourism Society has elected to hold its 2008 annual conference in the town. This certainly reflects the tremendous drive, passion, and commitment that characterises the local tourism industry, and, thanks to close partnership working between the public and private sectors at all levels, has resulted in St Helens’s growing profile as a regional visitor destination.

"This is also a great opportunity to showcase to the national tourism industry not only what St Helens has to offer, but also to profile the rest of Merseyside and the North West in the year that neighbouring Liverpool will be the European Capital of Culture."

Flo Powell, executive director of the Tourism Society, said: "The Tourism Society selected St Helens to host our 2008 conference because the borough has a great story to tell that I have no doubt will be of interest and benefit to other destinations across the country.

"From a position six or so years ago where it had no association with tourism whatsoever, St Helens is now cited by the Northwest Development Agency as an example to others in terms of its approach to tourism development.

“This has been achieved by maximising its existing assets, capitalising on new opportunities and emerging markets, exploiting its prime connectivity at the heart of the North West, and working incredibly hard with local private sector operators and public agencies such as The Mersey Partnership and NWDA.

"I would urge all to come and find out more about the borough’s remarkable transformation first hand, at the same time as hearing about wider regional and national developments and taking advantage of excellent networking opportunities at what is one of the major conferences of the year for the tourism industry."

larryneild