Commenting on new figures published by the CSO for overseas arrivals to Ireland for January to November, 2018, Niall Gibbons, CEO of Tourism Ireland, said, "2018 is set to be another record year for Irish tourism and [the latest] CSO figures indicate that we welcomed almost 9.9 million overseas arrivals during January to November. This represents growth of almost 7% – or 628,100 additional visitors – on the same eleven-month period last year.
"Particularly welcome in [the CSO's] figures is the continued strong performance from North America, with an increase of 13.1%. A number of factors are working in our favour, including more airline seats than ever before, from more gateways across the US and Canada. We’ve also seen really good results from Mainland Europe, up 9% on January-Novemer last year, with particularly strong performances from Germany (+19.4%) and Italy (+11.2%). Tourism Ireland has prioritised North America and mainland Europe, as markets which offer a strong return on investment, in terms of holiday visitors and expenditure.
"Visitors from Australia and emerging markets like China are up almost 7%. While we welcome the fact that arrivals from Britain are up 1%, the continued uncertainty around Brexit and its impact on outbound travel from Britain remains a real concern.
"Fill Your Heart With Ireland"
Gibbons added, "This week, our new global campaign, 'Fill Your Heart With Ireland', is launching in cinemas, on TV and on social platforms in our top four markets – the United States, Britain, France and Germany. The campaign will roll out further in the new year in Canada, Australia, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands and Scandinavia. We are confident that our new campaign will help deliver another record year for tourism in 2019. Our aim is to grow overseas tourism revenue in 2019 to €6.5 billion, for the island of Ireland."
© 2018 Hospitality Ireland – your source for the latest industry news. Article by Dave Simpson. Click subscribe to sign up for the Hospitality Ireland print edition.
