The Sunshine Coast is reportedly continuing its strong tourism recovery with solid growth in international arrivals up 1.8% for 12 months to June 30, compared with 2012-13 results, mostly due to Kiwi’s seeking out sunny days.
The Coast reports an 8% growth in overall visitor nights and a substantial increase of 23.1% in international visitor expenditure to $214.5 million compared with the previous year.
The star international performer was the New Zealand market, which grew by 8.4% to establish it as the region’s number one international source market. The Canadian market grew by 26%, and many of the European markets showed encouraging signs of recovery.
Commenting on the figures, Sunshine Coast Destination Ltd (SCDL) CEO, Simon Ambrose, said that while the figures were impressive, information from Sunshine Coast operators suggested that the last six months had produced an even stronger recovery, far outperforming the corresponding six months in 2013.
“It has been a tremendous start to the year for tourism in the Sunshine Coast, and our increased activity promoting the region overseas during the past 12 months is beginning to bear fruit,” Mr Ambrose said.
“All our reports indicate that after an outstanding summer for both domestic and international travel, the pace of recovery has continued throughout the year, with strong performances in the leisure and business events sectors.
“Looking forward, we have just completed filming – using drone technology – a new advertising campaign based around the region’s ‘Naturally Refreshing’ theme, and this will be released later in the year both in Australia and New Zealand, where we believe there is even greater potential for growing visitation thanks to the seasonal direct air services from Auckland into Sunshine Coast Airport.”