Billion dollar visitor spend is a goer for Tourism Noosa
NOOSA'S marketing gurus have ambitious plans for the local tourism spend to bust through the $1 billion mark in four years to create 1500 new jobs.
And a key factor is not only tapping further into Noosa's green sustainable appeal, but ensuring service with a smile to keep the visitors coming back.
Tourism Noosa launched its new strategic vision for the future - the Sustainable Destination Action Plan 2013-16.
The plan supports the State Government's aims to double visitor expenditure in Queensland by 2020.
However Noosa wants to achieve its $1 billion share by 2016.
At present regional, national and international visitors are pouring $867 million a year into the Noosa economy.
Tourism Noosa general manager Damien Massingham said Noosa needs to put more effort into product development.
"What that means is that in the 1990s people were really focussed on improving their product - that has actually waned right across Australia," Mr Massingham said.
"So we want to lead the way forward in increasing our customer service, increasing our refurbs and having new product to fill product gaps."
He said this would help restore Noosa's desirability status in the eyes of the market.
"At the moment we're at about 12% - it's dropped to be honest over the last eight to 10 years. We want to get it up to where it was before and really get back to the halcyon days of around about 15%."
Two of the actions planned are revitalising quality of service with an increase in industry accredited training and positioning Noosa "as a leader in corporate social responsibility that delivers real conservation outcomes".
Tourism Noosa chairman Steve McPharlin said the plan was developed partly through member planning workshops with stakeholders who realise what's at stake.
"Tourism is the single biggest contributor to the economy in the Noosa region attracting over 1.8 million visitors annually and generating an estimated 8000 full-time equivalent jobs, equating to at least 14,000 people employed in the industry."
Nicole Anderson of Trios By The River restaurant at Tewantin said it was a fantastic idea to lift the standard of the local tourism product.
"It will hopefully really improve things for us," Ms Anderson said.
"We need to differentiate ourselves by offering the best customer service there is in Australia because that's something it really lacks.
"We need to provide good, consistent fresh food from my industry perspective anyway and that will keep people coming back."
