Included in this update:
Welcome to our latest regional update where we look back at our key activity to support and promote tourism in Perthshire during the last quarter.
As we start the traditional tourism season, we are aware that there are still challenges facing many in our industry, and we're working hard to ensure that Scotland’s profile remains visible to visitors in our key markets in order to drive demand. When visitors get here, we know that they will receive a great welcome, with Perthshire being home to many award winning businesses. This was demonstrated with two wins for Perthshire at the National Final of the Scottish Thistle Awards in February.
I have enjoyed being out and about over the last few months, such as the recent Perthshire Talks Tourism event on adventure tourism and joining the Blairgowrie and East Perthshire Local Tourism Association meeting. There are a number of opportunities coming over the horizon, such as The Hauntings at The Black Watch Castle & Museum this summer, the UCI World Cycling Championships Gran Fondo in August and the opening of Perth Museum next year.
We remain committed to doing what we can to support our industry. Whether it’s attracting more visitors to the region through our marketing and travel trade activity, providing practical advice on the cost-of-doing business or working with partners to create opportunities for growth.
As part of our newly launched consumer website visitscotland.com, we've updated and refreshed our suite of destination pages. Check out our new look destination page for Perthshire which is full of inspiring information on what to see and do and where to stay across the region.
Check out some of our new and refreshed blogs on visitscotland.com featuring Perthshire:
Locations, and businesses across Perthshire feature within our programme of consumer e-newsletters. Recent editions have included dog friendly hotel The Green Park Hotel in Pitlochry, Ben Vrackie for walking, gold panning with Highland Safaris and archery with Willowgate Activity Centre among others.
Perth was featured as an easy travel connection for visitors from Germany, France, and Spain in a partnership with tour operator Holiday Pirates. Targeting warm audiences through Holiday Pirate's channels, promotion included social media posts, newsletters, app pushes and deals driving people to a dedicated page on its website.
Perth hotels and attractions were promoted to UK travellers as part of a spring extension to our five-month existing campaign with Expedia. The campaign aimed to raise awareness of Scotland's cities and featured Perth City on website banners driving bookings to a dedicated landing page, which featured Perth imagery and content.
A press trip with a writer from Hopezine (magazine and blog) focused on accessibility and wheelchair use when exploring the area. The trip included a visit to the Enchanted Forest, a meal at Ballintaggart, and an overnight stay at Blairmore Farm. Reach approx. 100,000.
A group of French journalists, hosted by the PR team in mid-February, visited the east of Scotland. As a result, this piece has been published by Lonely Planet and features Pitlochry and Dunkeld. Take a look at the article.
Drummond Castle Gardens were featured in a round-up of Outlander locations in the online version of popular German TV and entertainment magazine TV Spielfilm.
The team have been out and about attending the special preview of the brand-new indoor adventure play and café at Active Kids Adventure Park. They were also on-stand at the Perth College Open Day to share information about the area to potential students and parents.
In other big news for the Perth iCentre – the team have been very excited to welcome their very own sheep, as part of the “Meet the Flock campaign”. You can find pictures of our lovely new "ewe" sheep on the Perthshire Facebook group.
And lastly from the team, opening hours for the Perth iCentre have changed, closing on a Sunday all-year apart from in July and August.
As always, pop in and say hello to our iCentre teams in Perth and Pitlochry – they'd all love to hear from you.
Comrie Croft scooped the award for Responsible Tourism and Thyme Deli & Bistro at Errichel Farm won the Food Tourism Award at the National Finals in February this year. The Scottish Thistle Awards National Final is the highest accolade in the Scottish hospitality, tourism, and events sector. Huge congratulations to our winners!
The 2023 UCI Cycling World Championships takes place in Glasgow and across Scotland in August this year. As part of this, Perth & Kinross will play host to the Gran Fondo road race on Friday 4 August.
Gran Fondo (which translates as “Big Race”) is a long-distance, mass participation event that celebrates competitive cycling. Find out more.
Partners and tourism businesses are encouraged to help promote both the event as well as celebrate the #PowerOfTheBike
Our latest campaign "Scotland. Made for Cycling" has been designed to create a compelling proposition to underpin the focus on Scotland as a leading cycling tourism destination, in the run-up to and beyond the 2023 UCI Cycling World Championships. Check out our campaign video and share with your visitors.
Perthshire Talks Tourism is a series of webinars and in-person events that covers a range of issues or topics impacting the tourism sector across Perthshire.
Our most recent event took place in March and focused on all-things-adventure tourism in Perthshire with an agenda of inspiring local speakers.
Presentations from this event and a summary of useful resources from our speakers is available online.
Event summaryOur next in-person event will be an evening themed around culture tourism. With so much happening across Perth city and the wider region, it's the ideal time to update you on the wealth of exciting cultural experiences awaiting visitors to the area.
The event will take place at the Perth Art Gallery on 25 May from 5 - 7pm, tourism and event businesses from across Perthshire are invited to attend. More information to follow.
Perthshire on social (January – March)
3.43 million reach
Number of times Perthshire content reached people on their social channels
231,000 engagements
Reactions, likes, comments, shares and saves of Perthshire posts
Reach of one million
Top performing post by reach on Facebook was our "Happy Coosday" post from Glen Lyon