Welcome to eventBritain
Welcome to eventBritain
“The newly established eventBritain team has one core objective – to work with UK industry partners to support any bids they make for sporting, business and cultural events”
With the adoption of an events support strategy, and the creation of eventBritain, VisitBritain has a wonderful opportunity to make a real contribution to the visitor economy. Already there are 450 major events held nationally worth around £1 billion to the UK economy (Leisure Industry Research Centre) and the potential goes so much further. VisitBritain must ensure that the rewards that arise from hosting the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2012 can be exploited to the maximum. We know from previous studies from hosting cities can produce fantastic results but eventBritain must galvanise this chance to act as a true catalyst within the industry and reap the rewards that the events industry offers and fully exploit the enormous appetite that all our industry partners and stakeholders have for this sector (15% of delegates alone at the 2007 SportAccord event were from UK).
Facts that speak for themselves:-
- The average spend per visit from a person attending an exhibition/trade fair (£645) or large conference (£668) is substantially higher (44%) than a general leisure visitor (£456) demonstrating the higher yield – IPS 2005.
- Business visits and events (business visits (27%) and sporting events (23%)) are likely to accrue up to 50% of the overall benefit from the London 2012 Games (Atlanta doubled its convention business over its Games decade, Barcelona’s convention bureau business increased by 129% in the year following the 1992 games, business visit arrivals to Australia increased by 78% between 1993 and 1997 and by 17% between 1997 and 2000) – (DCMS).
- A recent study by KPMG for Advantage West Midlands puts the overall impact of business visits and events for the Birmingham alone at £2.3 billion, and employing 36,700 FTE jobs in the region.
- Seasonality – 49% of business tourism occurs between October and March – the equivalent figure for leisure travel is 37% (IPS).
- Regionality – only 23% of inbound business travel occurs to London – the equivalent figure for leisure travel is 42% (IPS)