As visitor attractions count down the weeks to reopening, it’s important to reflect on the key trends for tourism. Organisations will be looking at the lessons learned during the last 12 months, and thinking about how to apply these to our businesses.

Following on from successful Tourism Summits in previous years, Visit Cornwall is holding its first ever virtual Tourism Week this week (8-12 March 2021), and we listened to Bernard Donoghue from the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions as he reflected on the insights he has gained since the outbreak of the pandemic.

Here’s a recap of the main points from Bernard’s presentation, where he was speaking about the challenges and opportunities for the visitor attraction sector in 2021.

There’s three key areas that visitor attractions will always need to focus on

These are:

Value - ticket price and value for money
Volume - getting the visitor numbers through the year
Visitor Experience - your reputation and the experience you’re giving people

Organisations need to balance the three objectives to achieve wise sustainable growth but trying to balance these things in 2021 will be a bigger challenge than in previous years

What are the key features of successful visitor attractions?

The visitor attractions who have grown and managed to buck the trend in the last year have shared traits and these are:

Provocative
Disruptive
Take risks
Stretch their brand
Develop new audiences

Ten things we’ve learned in the last year - and how they’ll affect visitor attractions moving forward

There’s a greater political appreciation of the size and value of the tourism industry and cultural sector to our health, lives and economies, -shown in the support and funding secured by lobbying through ALVA and UK Hospitality to DCMS
We’ve seen an inspiring explosion of sharing and collaboration within the sector, with some exciting creative partnerships fostered which should be nurtured and grown. These should be encouraged to continue moving forward.
We’ve seen the importance of front of house staff reinforced in these uncertain times. Visitor atrractions are the most reviewed businesses on TripAdvisor. A 5* star review on TripAdvisor is more likely to have a named staff individual in it . The difference between a 4 star review and a 5 star one is your staff.
We’ve learned the importance of digital to complement, to entice, excite, entertain and invite - but not to replace the visitor experience. Attractions have been able to be open - even when they’re not - and in many cases, this has brought them to new audiences
We need to have an acceptance that what we did in the past may not have been perfect, and to see this year as an the opportunity to consider whether this is a chance to innovate and be different in our reopening and our recovery - we need to make sure we don’t just replicate what we did before
We have a chance to look at new audiences - we can reopen our doors to different people from those we closed them to at the start of the first lockdown. Are there people engaging with your digital content who aren’t crossing your physical threshold? Why are people choosing not to come to you?
Gifts bought from visitor attractions shops show that people are prioritising shared experiences and memory making. Jigsaws, gardening sets, local history books, cake baking sets were some of the top selling gifts. We’re seeing an explosion in the experience economy, and an appreciation of the value of storytelling and memory making. Visitor attractions are well placed to be at the heart of this change.
People yearn to return to their favourite attractions, they are a key part of their lives. Visitors were desperate, between lockdowns, to return to their favourite places to spend time as a family. Last year, we saw substantial growth in memberships, with an 82% retention figure as well. We also saw unprompted personal giving at many attractions, and a huge growth in volunteering. How do we reciprocate the loyalty?
Sanitise your site, but not the visitor experience - make sure you are mindful of health and safety but do not do this at the expense of the visitor experience. Do not dampen the joy of their day. Make cleanliness an important part of your service, rather than the experience.
You create the backdrop for people’s happiest memories.

Visitor attractions need to:

Listen to our visitors and what they want
Challenge ourselves and consider doing things differently
Advocate for what you do and what you believe in
Demonstrate what you do and be authentic about it
Gather data and evidence

Attractions aren’t just where you grow jobs, they are where you grow people. They nurture people and bring them comfort and joy, providing places where they can grow and be with people they love. That’s a fantastic opportunity and responsibility for those of us working in the industry,

Association of Leading Visitor Attractions

ALVA's members are the UK's most popular, iconic and important museums, galleries, palaces, castles, cathedrals, zoos, historic houses, heritage sites, gardens and leisure attractions.

They comprise over 2200 tourist sites, hosting over 119 million domestic and overseas visitors each year - around 28% of the visits made annually in the UK.

ALVA represent their members to Government, media and business and lobby for support for the sector. They provide training, benchmarking and advocacy initiatives to assist members to continually improve the visitor experience.

Who is Bernard Donoghue?

Bernard Donoghue has been the Director of ALVA since September 2011 following a career in advocacy, communications and lobbying, latterly at a senior level in the tourism and heritage sector. In May of 2017 the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, appointed Bernard to be the Mayor's Ambassador for Cultural Tourism and a member of the Mayor's Cultural Leadership Board.

He has been a member of of the UK Government's Tourism Industry Council since 2016 and was appointed to be a member of the London Transition Board in June 2020, tasked with the sustainable recovery of the arts, cultural and creative industries sector in the light of COVID19.

What are the key trends for visitor attractions in 2021?