We forget that tourism is a business with many moving parts not under the control of operators, venues and the like…
Most tourism bodies cite a vibrant and well managed municipality as probably the most vital cog in this machine.
When one leg fails then the industry becomes disenchanted and fear and doubt permeate amongst the members.
We have all witnessed how seemingly charming hosts turn from charming to snarling whenever confronted with major challenges from an incompetent municipality struggling to fix roads and infrastructure in a declining environment.
That negativity then extends into the working environment and has a subtle negative influence on all that it touches.
Then the operators descend further into a blame game – blaming every outside influence that they can name for their woes.
Frankly – we have a situation where the Friendly City of Port Elizabeth disappeared to become the ‘Not so Friendly City of Gqeberha’.
We need to get over the fact that Port Elizabeth as a name is gone and we need to look at how we can capitalise on our natural beauty our incredible events and even more incredibly friendly people.
Yes, we have challenges but we need to overcome and embrace those as part of our tourism offering.
In my mind is remembrance of just how dynamic and single minded our tourism offering was – we can get it back, all it takes is for us to promote our little slice of heaven positively and regularly.
My little contribution to that is within what we do…
CLICK HERE to read the FULL Showcasing Gqeberha Tourism article.
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