Global Watch - 2012

Operating Environment

Prevailing economic conditions influencing the Australian and NT tourism are expected to see travel trends from last year continue in 2012.

Ultimately the weather had a big impact on domestic visitation to the NT last year as Darwin experienced the second wettest and Australia the third wettest year on record.  The subsequent late start to the dry season in the Top End along with the Queensland floods all combined to contribute to major declines in the holiday market.

The strong Australian dollar has seen Australians continue to show an increasing preference to holiday overseas rather than locally.  The strong growth in outbound tourism saw an additional 1,800 Australians departing for overseas every day last year, led particularly by increases to Indonesia (Bali) and the USA.

Industry Outlook for the NT

The Tourism NT industry operator poll has just been released revealing the Territory tourism operators to have a collectively sober outlook for the next twelve months.

Short Trip Trends

Australians holidaying locally tend to take shorter holidays instead of taking one big one, but are taking more holidays throughout the year. This trend impacts on the traditional long trip domestic visitor to the Territory and the challenge is for NT operators to tap into this short trip market, which is seen nationally as having the highest potential for growth in the short term.  This trend is in part due to the proliferation of low cost carriers enabling travellers to afford more flights per year, as well as changing lifestyles.  Recent research by Tourism NT looked at ways to encourage visitors to disperse out of Darwin while on holiday, with relevant insights for businesses operating in and around Darwin.

The Drive Market

The interstate drive market, a key market for regional NT, increased nationally for the first time in six years, coinciding with the baby boomers starting to retire.  Tourism NT is monitoring this market closely in 2012 and working to promote the NT to the touring market by launching a new campaign partnering with Britz and BIG 4.  Tourism NT is calling for operators to get involved and inspire more of the drive market to the Territory.

Intra-Territory and VFR Travel

Overall, the number of Australians on interstate holidays is on the decline Australia wide.  This result is tempered in states which have large local populations travelling within their own state.  Although the NT has a small population, tourism operators could look to entice Territorians to experience a holiday closer to home to pick up on this trend.  This also includes encouraging locals to take their interstate friends and relatives out of town when they visit.  Travel researchers TNS call this market the ‘hidden travel’ market and recommend that attractions consider a discount scheme to encourage residents to take their visitors to the attraction.  The recently developed VFR (or Visiting Friends and Relatives) fact sheet has more information on this market.

Europe and the USA

Similar to the domestic market, the international market has also been influenced by the severe economic conditions in European markets over the past twelve months.  This has led to significant declines from our key inbound markets, the UK, Germany and France, both to the NT and Australia-wide.  The good news was that for the US market the NT bucked the trend and increased visitors to Central Australia.  This increase came on the back of better access links from Sydney to Uluru, a major attraction for the American visitors following in Oprah’s footsteps.  The core western markets are not expected to recover in 2012 and operators with a heavy reliance on these international markets can expect another difficult year.

Japan and Asia

Just as the Japanese market was showing signs of a recovery, the devastating March earthquake and subsequent tsunami put holidays on hold. Tourism Australia reports the Japanese consumer remains in a ‘restrained mood’.  For the latest domestic and international visitor numbers in the NT, check out the quarterly Quick Statistics publication.

The Chinese continue to visit Australia in large numbers, at this stage most visiting New South Wales, Queensland and Victoria (97%), while just 9% visit any region outside of these states.  Tourism NT is working to get a greater share of this market and the January charter flight from Hong Kong to Darwin and Uluru brought 300 Chinese visitors to the NT following a major campaign in China last year.

Improved Darwin Air Access

Recent developments in aviation have seen the announcement of new two international new routes into Darwin, that of Silk Air and Jetstar.  The Silk Air flight provides a premium full service carrier connecting to Singapore Airlines network and opens up opportunities for cooperative marketing campaigns to promote connections to Darwin from around the world.  News of an alliance between Silk Air and Virgin Australia means that Darwin is better placed to be a gateway to Australia as an increasing number of visitors use Darwin as the arrival point for their Australia trip. 

The Jetstar flight from Japan via Manila opens up Darwin and the Top End as new destination for Japanese travellers and places the region well to capitalise on new opportunities when the market rebounds.