ATTRACT
Tourism is a key economic sector for the regions of the Atlantic Area. However, the tourism attractiveness of the area presents high disparities due to the fact that some localities do not fully maximise their touristic potential and remain low profile touristic destinations.
Some localities remain low profile touristic destinations for a number of correlated factors: negative perception of the area (ex: tacky, old school, boring image), limited diversification of touristic population (ex: only seniors, only young adults), lack of innovative touristic activities (ex: no alternative to the promenade and the tea room), inexistent territorial marketing approach (ex: no brand image, minimised use of NTICs, isolated strategy).
In the context of globalisation where cities and regions compete to increase their touristic attractiveness, it is more pertinent to challenge this negative factors through a transnational approach rather than individually.
The ATTRACT project aims to improve the touristic attractiveness of low profile touristic destinations from the Atlantic area by exchanging experience and developing innovative activities on territorial marketing and sustainable tourism.
ATTRACT will be articulated around the following activities:
1.Comparative benchmarking exercise on the partner’s best practices, approaches and cultures: workshops and manual.
2.Transnational market study on the partner’s touristic potential (innovative sustainable touristic activities to developed, marketing tools to adopted, news populations to target): research body and report.
3.Joint methodological protocol on partner’s touristic attractiveness strategy: transnational body and tool-box.
4.Exchange of staff between the project partners: work placements.
5.Cooperative promotional schemes on the tourism profile of the partner’s area: marketing campaigns including exchange of brochures, promotion of a transnational activity calendar, development of multi-linguistic websites, organisation of photo exhibitions.
6.Implementation of local touristic strategies: e.g training and workshops for local SMES and tourist professional.
7.Implementation of eco-tourism pilots activities: e.g transnational eco-food festival.
The ATTRACT project aims to improve the touristic attractiveness of low profile touristic destinations from the Atlantic area by exchanging experience and developing innovative activities on territorial marketing and sustainable tourism.
ATTRACT will contribute:
To balance the polycentric development of the Atlantic area by reinforcing the attractiveness of peripherical areas.
To maximise the touristic potential of the partners’ territories by increasing their European recognition as quality tourism destinations.
To strengthen the competitive position of the partners’ territories by improving the quality of the tourism products and developing attractive touristic activities.
To challenge existing strategies by improving the skills of the partner’s tourism professionals on sustainable tourism and territorial marketing.
To participate to the economic regeneration of the partners’ territories by creating a stronger image and identity as well as creating new employment opportunities.
To reinforce local networks and to exploit local potential to improve competitiveness by developing innovative products and connecting with local SMEs. To establish a permanent trans-national network of regions that share a common issue and see value in coming together to develop solutions.
2011-2013
About € 250,000 per partner and per year
