In the middle of a packed Rendez-Vous Canada (RVC), Karryon sat down with Destination Canada President & CEO Marsha Walden, who unsurprisingly, personifies the brand and the country she represents.
Marsha joined Destination Canada as President and CEO in August 2020 in the throes of the COVID-19 pandemic. She is proud to lead a team of passionate professionals who share a common purpose of inspiring those with glowing hearts to fall in love with Canada – enriching the lives of visitors and enhancing the quality of life of Canadians.
Destination Canada’s new brand is built on a concept of openness. Open hearts and open minds, and being true to who you really are. That openness and authenticity is being felt through every interaction at RVC 2023, from presentations to performances, one-on-one meetings, as well as the warm and welcoming hosts, the Québécois people.
How do you promote an entire country, especially one as large and diverse as Canada?
To establish a brand you have to find things that the world respects about you as a country, that makes you enticing and that are true to who you are as the land and as people. With our new brand positioning around openness, we really feel that we’ve struck the right chord, and I think Canada can offer a unique combination of things that are about openness.
We’ve always been known for wide open spaces and beautiful scenery, and we continue to lean into that because that’s one of the things the world loves about Canada, but we also are known for, and I think are appealing, because of our open minds. The fact that 25 per cent of our population was not born here means we are a land of both incredible history through our indigenous culture, but also more recent arrivals make us very diverse and open minded.
Who we are as a brand and how we sell ourselves now is really around this unique combination and blend of openness. We work hard as a culture to foster a sense of belonging in Canada because many of us have come from elsewhere. I’m the daughter of immigrants and they found a home here and were made to feel that they belonged and were welcome and I think that’s part of who we are as a brand, and maybe why the world often characterizes us as ‘nice’.
What does Canada love about Australian visitors?
I think we share a lot in terms of our attitude about life. So when Australians visit Canada, they’re great guests. It’s like having someone come into your home that respects who you are and is an appreciative guest, so that’s a very good starting place.
From a purely economic perspective, we love Australians because when they come, they like to stay a long time. As a wealthy country they have the resources to spend money with us and like to engage in local activities. You’re not necessarily dropping all your dollars in the Chanel store, which may not have the same kind of circular economic impact that shopping in the local places would have. You try to get closer to who Canadians are, and consequently spend your money locally.
The other thing we really like is that Australians are four season visitors. You like our winters, you like our summers, you come in the fall, anytime, and that’s really helpful to our tourism economy. We’re quite a seasonal destination and when we look at visitors that like to come in any season, that’s valuable.
On top of it all, we get so many of your youth that like to come and work in our industry and that’s a great way to introduce someone to a country and hopefully they’ll come back and build a lifelong love affair with Canada, and we desperately need and appreciate the workforce.
Are you seeing any new trends or new traveller types?
At first, the pent-up demand was just so strong everybody was anxious to get out and go. Now we are seeing the impacts of inflation and a shift to a higher value traveller. People that are less price sensitive perhaps, and I think that shift will likely continue to occur over time.
I think for every country in the world, including Canada, the rise of domestic travel was inspiring to see. The fact that your own citizens who really finally appreciate the land that they are part of, and it was maybe of necessity initially, but I think that the trend will be that people have come to discover there’s lots to see in their own countries and for us that’s important in creating a sense of unity across the country, especially one as large as Canada.
Everyone’s talking about blended travel, and I think in this new work from home, or work from anywhere environment, there will be more opportunities for people to blend their work and their vacation life. Even I’ve been thinking about it, I’m desperate to try to improve my French and should just go work from a French community somewhere in Québec and immerse myself to elevate what I’m capable of. The French culture here [in Québec] is just so charming.
What do you think are some of the biggest opportunities for the industry?
For Canada, I think it’s to grow our seasonal visitation. Trying to massively expand the assets that we have is a 10-year journey, but we have enormous opportunity in the shorter term, to use our seasons better because we don’t have a lot of excess capacity in the summer even now when we’re on the brink of full recovery.
We really have to understand how to utilize those assets in other seasons, bringing visitors in the fall and winter, and that will have a beneficial effect overall, because the more of those assets are utilized, the better the ROI for that investment becomes and that creates reinvestment in infrastructure and it’s kind of a self-reinforcing cycle.
It’s really important to us to make sure that we’re building out our fall and our winter product and that’s what we’ll be talking to the travel trade about. As I’ve said earlier, Australians are very open to that so that’s maybe where we’ll get the flywheel beginning.
How important is the travel trade to Canada?
Very important, and my message to the trade would be, thank you. Throughout the pandemic the travel trade held it all together for most travellers, it was impossible to understand what was going on in the world and consumers really relied on the knowledge of the travel trade.
That was extremely challenging for so much work to be done without any income stream associated, so we greatly value and appreciate the role that travel trade had through keeping things happening during the pandemic.
Now I think that’s bearing fruit for all of us because consumers have recognised the critical role that travel trade plays in travel planning, and the reassurances that come with having an expert that can help you on that journey. We’re keen to rekindle all those relationships and I’m very thankful for the support that the travel trade trade gave, not just to Canada but to all travellers.
Karryon is on location at RVC Canada, which is taking place in Quebec City.
For more information on Destination Canada, click here.
Psst. Travel Advisors… here’s a famil-iar treat for you.
Advisors who are registered in the Canada Specialist Program will go in the draw for two upcoming Canada famils in September and October 2023.
Join the Canada Specialist Program to learn more about the country’s diverse landscapes and experiences, and gain access to exclusive content and valuable tools to help you promote and sell Canada. Plus, network with other agents via the closed CSP Facebook group.
Click here to sign up by the end of July 2023 to be in the running to win a spot on a Canada famil or find out more here.
