WITH Western Australia's tourism industry finding itself reliant on an intrastate market since the onset of COVID-19, the State's regional towns need to unearth and promote their unique offerings in order to attract more visitors.
Speaking at the Dowerin Do-Over late last month, Tourism WA partnerships and industry manager Tabetha Beggs said the role of the organisation had shifted since the onset of the pandemic due to international and interstate travel restrictions.
"Since COVID-19 began, we have found ourselves in the intrastate market, which pre-COVID had generally been a space that we left up to our regional tourism organisations," Ms Beggs said.
While acknowledging the havoc COVID-19 had wreaked on certain parts of the tourism industry that rely heavily on interstate and international markets, Ms Beggs said the restrictions had also afforded Western Australians an opportunity to get out to the regions and get to know their own backyard.
She said Tourism WA's 'Wander out Yonder' campaign had been one of the most successful campaigns embarked upon by the organisation and yielded "incredible results" for regional WA.
"Some regions have reported their best seasons in living history and we certainly take our hats off to the people of WA for taking that call to action and wandering out yonder to discover or rediscover some of the places in their own backyards," Ms Beggs said.
Tourism WA's next focus will be on how they can promote regional tourism in a post-COVID world.
"Tourism is competitive and probably even more so in WA because we are such a large State and have so much to showcase in each of our regions," Ms Beggs said.
"So once the borders are lifted and people can travel here, we need to be ready for that - for example, do we have accommodation in places to support all the visitors?
"It's important to identify what we have that nobody else has and we also need to understand what will make people want to stay longer."
As part of the Dowerin Do-Over, Ms Beggs and Tourism WA event development manager Renee Zaffino held a 'How to build your town's tourism narrative' workshop where participants were asked to discuss what made their own region special and create an "adventure asset register" for their respective towns.
Ms Zaffino said events were a great way to get an influx of people into the regions and could provide significant economic benefits to the towns in which they are held.
"The events add extra tourism dollars, they encourage overnight stays, add vibrancy and often gain media coverage for the town and the region," Ms Zaffino said.
Tourism WA offers two funding programs for regional events - the Regional Events Scheme (RES) and the Regional Events Program (REP).
Through RES you can apply for funding between $5000 to $40,000 per year for your event, while REP is for the bigger events with funding $40,000 and upwards.
Some examples of regional events that have received RES funding include the Avon Descent, The Yalgoo Emu Festival, Busselton Jetty Swim, The Margaret River Readers and Writers Festival and the Boyup Brook Country Music Festival.
"Through RES we funded 77 events and have a budget of $1 million each year," Ms Zaffino said.
"The bigger events that were funded through REP include Ord Valley Muster, Margaret River Gourmet Escape, Margaret River Pro, Truffle Kerfuffle, Taste Great Southern and Ironman.
"What we look for in events is uniqueness and people from other regions coming to your town specifically for that event, spending tourism dollars and hopefully spending one or two nights in that region."
- More information: go to tourism.wa.gov
