Photo: Luskentyre Beach, Isle of Harris

Welcome to the latest VisitScotland eUpdate, giving you an overview of VisitScotland's current activities.

This month:

• Gongs Aplenty: Success at the Scottish Marketing Society Marketing Excellence Awards.
  
• BookingScotland.com Trade Website: Find out how you can get involved.
  
• Discover the Essence of Scotland: a new strategy for VisitScotland's Freedom brand.
  
• Edinburgh launches Scotland's first City Pass.
  
• Scotland's Finest Flavours: Aberdeen and Grampian launches food and drink initiative.
  
• Wildlife Month at VisitScotland's London office.

A New Team for Tourism

We have just passed the half way stage of our project to restructure the tourism support network. On the 1 April 2005, area tourist boards (ATBs) merged with VisitScotland to become one body. This new team for tourism is now called VisitScotland.
As tourism businesses, you will not see a major change at the half way stage. ATB offices all remain in place as VisitScotland network offices. These offices will be managed by area directors.

Although ATB membership will no longer exist, network offices will provide continuity of service to businesses. You should already have received the new marketing opportunities for 2006/7. This latest round incorporates the new business opportunity package which has been structured to deliver an effective blend of promotional activity for tourism businesses across Scotland. If you have not received information or if you have any questions regarding the latest round of marketing opportunities, please contact your local VisitScotland network office.
Tourist information centres (TICs) will continue as normal, as will our suite of quality assurance schemes and our wide range of local, national and international marketing activities.
For key contacts and further information on the new VisitScotland integrated network, please refer to http://www.scotexchange.net/tourism_organisations/scottishlevel/visitscotland/vs_structure.htm

Minister Hails Success of VisitScotland Challenge Fund

Patricia Ferguson, Minister for Tourism, Culture and Sport, welcomed the great success of the first round of the VisitScotland Challenge Fund.

The new scheme, developed by VisitScotland at the end of 2004, invites groups of tourism businesses from around Scotland to bid for financial assistance to support customer focused marketing campaigns in their areas. In its first round, the Challenge Fund is providing almost £300,000 into local marketing campaigns and assisting 29 groups representing over 1000 businesses in total.

The Minister met with some of the successful applicants from the first round of the Challenge Fund on Monday 16 May to welcome their success and praise the high quality of applicants from across Scotland. Encouraging others to apply for the second round of applications ahead of the 30 June deadline, the Minister said:

"This is a genuinely good news story for Scotland's tourism businesses. The VisitScotland Challenge Fund has clearly tapped into a rich vein of innovation, commitment and passion for the industry.

"One of the most impressive aspects of this, the first round, has been the manner in which tourism businesses have come together in their areas to develop genuinely imaginative marketing campaigns.

"The VisitScotland Challenge Fund has clearly chimed with both very small but highly professional groups and to larger, more established groups."

The successful groups who met with the Minister were:

The Seafood Trail - an initiative involving local businesses coming together around a new project using the Challenge Fund to support marketing activities.

Midlothian Tourism Forum - will use the Challenge Fund to target visitors living within easy driving distance of the area to enjoy the 'great outdoors'.

Experience Perthshire - an existing group, consisting of an accommodation provider, a visitor attraction and an activities provider who are using the Challenge Fund to develop marketing on joint activities.

Glasgow Restaurateurs Association - part of an existing Gourmet Glasgow Food Festival, Challenge funding will be used for the new Food Fest element and for marketing and PR campaigns.

Highlands Loch Ness - Challenge Funding will help support a programme of sales calls and activities to generate travel trade business for members in Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Italy.

Scotland's Best B&Bs - Challenge Funding will support the development of a new website downloadable brochure, special offers, pay per click advertising and clan sites.

Details of all successful applicants from the first round of the VisitScotland Challenge Fund will be available on www.scotexchange.net later this month.

Gongs Aplenty

VisitScotland picked up two major prizes at the recent Scottish Marketing Society Excellence Awards at Prestonfield House Hotel. The much coveted Marketing Excellence Awards were won for Strategic Excellence in:

Brand Development - An entry focusing on positioning Scotland as an Adventure Sports destination.
International Brand Development - An entry highlighting the European Branding leading to the pan-European campaign.

VisitScotland Borders Network Office were also successful at the Scottish Marketing Awards and are celebrating after winning a Commendation in the PR Excellence category. The commendation recognised the strategic and creative strengths of the organisation's PR initiatives over the past 18 months working with Borders based Artisan PR. The work included the creation of a dress made entirely of leaves from the region's trees, and the appointment of a Borders Dog Ambassador.

You can read the papers and winners in full by logging on to www.thedrum.co.uk

Tartan Week 2005, New York

Scotland's annual opportunity to make a big bang in the big apple began at the end of March with VisitScotland's Tartan Week activity. As well as promoting as a place to visit, VisitScotland used the opportunity to actively promote and market Scotland as a destination where business can be done.

VisitScotland's involvement with Tartan Day has grown over the last few years and has included a range of marketing activity, from traditional advertising to the launch of the www.tartandayNY.com website and from PR through to sponsorship of key events.
Tartan Week this year saw the debut of VisitScotland's fantastic new Scottish Village - a showcase for all that is best about Scotland. The Village appeared in Vanderbilt Hall, part of Grand Central Station from 1 to 10 April. An estimated 250,000 people visited the Scottish Village during its ten day stay in Vanderbilt Hall.

Interim Area Director - Edinburgh Area Office

VisitScotland has appointed an Interim Area Director to lead the Edinburgh Network office while the process of recruiting a permanent director is completed.

He is Riddell Graham, currently Director of Strategy, Partnerships and Communication at VisitScotland and previously the Chief Executive of the Scottish Borders Tourist Board. He will take up his interim position with immediate effect and will also retain his current Director's responsibilities.

Graham Birse, formerly the Director of Customer Development with ELTB, has opted not to take up a post with the new VisitScotland network and will leave the organisation at a date to be agreed within the next few days.

David Noble, Director of Operations, VisitScotland, said: "It is obviously important to us, and the industry, that we have in place senior staff with the skills and experience necessary to move forward our strategic objectives and engage with our partners. Riddell Graham has that experience and I'm pleased that he has agreed to take on this role while the external recruitment process to appoint an Area Network Director is concluded.

"I am equally sorry to see someone of Graham Birse's experience and ability leave the network, but he has obviously decided that he would like to pursue other opportunities and we wish him well in his future career."

Riddell Graham will be taking the opportunity to visit staff in the area network office and TICs throughout May.

The Area Director for the Dumfries Network office has also been confirmed, with Delia Holland, formerly Industry Relations Manager with VisitScotland, appointed to the post. A decision on the area director for the Dundee Network office is imminent.

Fife's Tourism Partnership Agreed

The future of Fife's tourism was sealed on Tuesday 10 May as Fife Council and VisitScotland signed their new tourism partnership agreement.

The three year agreement, which sets out Fife Council's commitment to the new VisitScotland network office in Fife to support tourism development in the Kingdom, was signed by Fife Council's Leader of the Administration, Councillor Anne McGovern and Philip Riddle, Chief Executive of VisitScotland.

The agreement sets out the roles and responsibilities of both organisations and highlights the activities to be provided in the first year, including:

• Provision of visitor services
  
• Provision of marketing services and activities
  
• Industry engagement
  
• Strategic development activities with partner organisations
  
• Operation of convention bureau facilities

Councillor Anne McGovern, commented: "Tourism is a significant contributor towards overall economic growth in Fife, bringing in around £206 million to the local economy in 2004 supported by 6,000 full-time jobs".

The establishment of the Fife Tourism Alliance, a new Fife-wide tourism body with sixteen members from both public and private sector, will be responsible for developing and overseeing the Fife Tourism Strategy.

Fife Council will work jointly with VisitScotland on a number of local marketing initiatives including golf tourism, promoting the Rosyth to Zeebrugge ferry link and contributing to the operation of the St Andrews Gateway Orientation Centre.

Best Borderer

The campaign to find the Best Borderer kicked off on Tuesday 6 May as the winner of last year's VisitScotland Borders's Best Borderer Award went on tour to launch this year's competition.

Jim Currie, Manager at Kelso Swimming Pool, visited five of the region's Tourist Information Centres (Kelso, Hawick, Peebles, Melrose, Eyemouth) to deliver nomination forms for this year's event and help to raise the profile of the competition and encourage entries.

Introduced by VisitScotland Borders last year, the Best Borderer competition forms part of the organisation's Borders Touch campaign, which aims to make everyone in the region more aware of the importance of customer service in their everyday lives. The competition aims to recognise individuals who add the small but much appreciated extra touches for others and who play a vital role in the life of the community, either in a business or social context.

The competition runs May - September with the winner announced in October.

For further detilas, contact:
Karen Leithead
Marketing and PR Officer
Tel: 01750 23818
Email: Karen.Leithead@visitscotland.com

Attempted Fraud Warning

We would like to bring to your attention an attempted fraud, which was reported to VisitScotland by a Scottish accommodation provider. The details of the fraud are as follows:

• e-mail from overseas - in this case from a "doctor" in California - looking for accommodation for a long spell (three months in this case).
  
• when availability confirmed, follow up e-mail asking how much it is, and offering to send banker's draft in full pre-payment - being paid by a third party.
  
• banker's draft arrives for more than the agreed amount - in this case twice the amount.
  
• follow-up call apologising for the confusion between the "doctor " and the other party regarding the amount, and saying just to bank the total and send the balance to another address.

The draft is obviously a fake, and the draft is not honoured.

CityCulture

The Cities and Culture team within UK & Ireland Marketing have recently launched the next segment of the CityBreaks campaign (previously known as myvisitscotland.com). This involved producing a supplement with the Independent newspaper entitled 'CityCulture - 100 best reasons to visit Scotland's cities'. The supplement was stitched within the newspaper's 'Information' magazine which takes a hitlist approach to a different topic each week. The CityCulture supplement adopted this approach to Scotland's CityCulture product and was compiled by reader votes on a number of cultural areas from museums and galleries to restaurants and bars.

The launch of this new segment has been accompanied by a redesign of the CityBreaks website which is now promoted via http://citybreaks.visitscotland.com/ which will replace the myvisitscotland.com web address.

With CityLife and CityActive already launched, the next cities segment will involve CityFreedom - basing yourself in the city while taking part in freedom activities such as walking and visiting gardens and taking day trips outwith the city.

To see a copy of the supplement or to find out more about the CityBreaks campaign contact linda.galt@visitscotland.com

SeaScotland

As part of the SeaScotland 2005 campaign, two press supplements were published with Scotland on Sunday. The first - SeaLife - was published on 17 April and focused on Scotland's rich maritime heritage and how visitors can learn about and experience Scotland's nautical history. The second - SeaLiving - concentrated on how people can get involved with Scotland's vast supply of the wet stuff, including everything from windsurfing to beach combing! Both supplements encouraged readers to go online to check out the number of SeaScotland events taking place throughout 2005 and to enter our competition to win an exclusive weekend break with 10 lucky runner up prizes of a month long supply of Mackies luxury ice-cream.

The next planned activity for SeaScotland will be a month long presence in VisitScotland's London office during June with exhibitions, competitions and much, much more planned. Anyone interested in becoming involved in SeaScotland's 'London month' should contact linda.galt@visitscotland.com

Vacation.com International Conference and Trade Show

Vacation.com, a subsidiary of Amadeus Global Travel Distribution, is the largest network of travel agencies in North America with over 8,000 member locations across the United States and Canada. Vacation.com's membership base is focused on leisure travel distribution, accounting for approximately 33% of all travel agencies in North America.

With more than $25 billion in annual sales, Vacation.com is North America's largest vacation selling network and continues to innovate and expand its influence in the rapidly changing travel distribution marketplace.

Vacation.com's annual International Conference and Trade Show, which has been a sell out for the past six years, is the perfect opportunity for suppliers to engage with these highly focused agents. The show features a general session detailing the state of the industry, a series of technology, supplier and product workshops and a half day tradeshow.

As a preferred destination, VisitScotland is able to attend the conference and can offer space on the Scotland trade show booth to Scottish partners. For more information, please contact Linda McAllister, Trade Promotions Executive on 0131 472 2328 or email linda.mcallister@visitscotland.com

BookingScotland.com Trade Website

VisitScotland's trade website continues to grow, providing a platform for suppliers of Scottish products to reach the North American retail travel trade. Recent research has shown that the SCOTS retail agent network (3000 agents) finds this resource particularly invaluable for finding information and booking Scottish vacations. Quotes from agents about the site include:

- "Your best web tool"
- "Excellent reference!"
- "Your listings are wonderful"
- "E-newsletter is a great way to learn about Scottish products"

Advertisers receive 50 words of copy, full contact details listing, an image/logo, the chance to insert copy in a fortnightly e-Newsletter and regular updates about your advert's performance. You will also be sent a copy of the SCOTS mailing database for your own marketing activities on a quarterly basis. The cost is £295 + VAT per year. Please contact tradepromotions@visitscotland.com for more information.

Discover the Essence of Scotland

Essence of Scotland, or Hub exploring, is a new strategy developed by the UK & Ireland Freedom team to meet the needs of many visitors to Scotland, who, on their break, base themselves in one location and do a number of day trips from that base.

Freedom's Spring campaign promoted this strategy to two distinct audiences:

• Those who had never been to Scotland before or not during the last 5 years (acquisition strategy).
  
• Those familiar with Scotland (retention strategy).

New Essence of Scotland leaflets have been developed to complement the Essential Guide to Scotland and will be used as response material. The Essence of Scotland leaflets cover 12 different areas of Scotland, targeted to be acquisition response or retention response:

1. Acquisition activity focuses on six areas which either people have heard of or are within easy drive time.
a. Edinburgh, Lothians and Fife (high awareness, good accessibility)
b. Loch Lomond, Stirling & the Trossachs (high awareness, good accessibility)
c. Galloway (short drive time)
d. Borders (short drive time)
e. Inverness, Loch Ness and Cairngorms (high awareness)
f. Skye & Lochalsh (high awareness)

2. Retention activity focuses on six areas which will encourage people who are familiar with Scotland to travel further afield and/or to extend their stay.
a. Arran (incorporating Ayrshire)
b. Orkney (incorporating Shetland)
c. Deeside (incorporating Aberdeen)
d. Highland Perthshire & Angus (incorporating Dundee)
e. Northwest Highlands (incorporating Western Isles)
f. Oban & Mull (incorporating Ardnamurchan)

All information was written entirely by the Freedom team in collaboration with colleagues from the former ATB network to give an 'insider's view' and is now also represented on visitscotland.com

This campaign cannot cover all areas of Scotland at once, however, there will be further opportunities for other areas of Scotland in due course

Next Steps
The strategy will be developed to cover different areas of Scotland for the retention audience and also to tailor them to life stage, such as, versions for families [for the Summer Scotland campaign], 'active' couples (either pre children or 'young at heart' empty nesters) and older couples (more passive activities) [for Autumn Gold].

For more information on this campaign, or for copies of the guides, please contact either judith.mair@visitscotlnd.com or nicol.nicolson@visitscotland.com

Launch of Wildlife Scotland

VisitScotland's Freedom brand launched the new Wildlife Scotland brochure, including Wild Scotland's new passport, with a Wildlife Safari Media Challenge on 16 May. VisitScotland's Highland office worked closely with the UK & Ireland PR team to bring seven of the top UK travel writers to experience the fantastic attractions and wildlife opportunities available in Scotland. Working in partnership with Wild Scotland, the wildlife safari media challenge splits two teams to compete, with a prize for the winning team and an individual prize for the best photograph.

Copies of the Wildlife Scotland brochure including the Wild Scotland passport are available from calling VisitScotland's National Booking and Information Line on 0845 22 55 121 or by logging onto www.visitscotland.com/wildlife

Edinburgh Launches Scotland's First City Pass

Visitors to Edinburgh will be able to see more of the city for less with the recent launch of the city's new European style visitor pass. The Edinburgh Pass has been produced thanks to the hard work of VisitScotland Edinburgh in conjunction with Scottish Enterprise Edinburgh & Lothians and The City of Edinburgh Council and Applied Card Technologies Ltd.

In Europe last year, over 2 million city cards were sold, demonstrating a high demand from today's city break visitors.

The Edinburgh Pass offers visitors the key ingredients of a short break to Edinburgh in one accessible package. Already, fifty five attractions, restaurateurs, retailers, transport and festival organisers will be participating and more are expected to get on board as the Edinburgh Pass attracts increased business to the city.

A further twenty six of Edinburgh's top retailers, restaurants, festival and leisure operators have signed up with exclusive offers. These include a £10 Day Pass to the five star Scotsman Hotel's Escape Health Club and a 'Two-for-One' breakfast at Indigo Yard.

The Edinburgh Pass can be bought online at www.edinburghpass.org or directly at VisitScotland Edinburgh's Tourist Information Centres.

For more information please contact Sinead Guerin,Tel: 0131 473 3641.
View the full press release on www.scotexchange.net

Tasty Revelations at Tourism Expo

The guide for Aberdeen and Grampian's Food and Drink initiative 'Scotland's Finest Flavours' was unveiled at VisitScotland Expo 2005 at the Aberdeen Exhibition and Conference Centre (AECC).

Cullen Skink, local cheeses and chutneys, Aberdeen Angus, Mackies Ice Cream, Dean's and Walkers Shortbread were all on the menu during the first day of VisitScotland Expo 2005.

The guide forms part of a wider marketing campaign to promote the Aberdeen and Grampian Highlands area as a food and drink destination of choice. The campaign includes targeted PR and Direct Marketing campaigns, the production of a dedicated website and event promotions.

The Food and Drink Tourism Initiative is a joint funded project between VisitScotland Aberdeen Network Office, Aberdeen City Council, Aberdeenshire Council, The Moray Council, Moray, Badenoch and Strathspey Enterprise, Scottish Enterprise Grampian and the European Economic Development Fund. The Grampian Food Forum is also supporting the initiative.
For more information on the project contact lucia.campbell@visitscotland.com or tel: 01224 288812.

Borders Launch Spring Showcase

Six newborn Borders lambs were treated to a touch of haute couture at the beginning of April at the launch of VisitScotland Borders Network Office's Spring marketing campaign.

To mark our latest bid to attract visitors to the region, and to highlight the region's textile heritage, VisitScotland Borders commissioned top Borders based designer Rosy Eribe of Eribe Knitwear to create special cashmere jackets for the lambs. Eribe clients include Liberty's of London and designers Paul Smith and Margaret Howell. The jackets were modelled at a Spring fashion show with a difference -by lambs in a field near Stow in the heart of the Borders countryside.

The lambs modelled six different Spring-inspired cashmere designs including a hand knitted twisted rib ruffle neck pullover with curlicue neck in china blue and pink, a multi coloured Fairisle yoke and dott pullover with pom poms at the neck, and a colourful Spring Flower design with bell edging at the neck and legs in bright pink and green.

For more information contact:
Karen Leithead
Tel: 01750 23818
Email: Karen.leithead@visitscotland.com

Outdoor Adventure information website

Lochaber is making great progress in its aim of becoming the Outdoor Capital of the UK.

A new tool is being developed by Tina Cuthbertson to provide visitors with all the information they might need to help them access the outdoors. For example, the website will provide information on marine and coastal activities such as launching, moorings, pontoons, piers and diesel supplies will be available.

The project has been developed and funded by Tina of Snowgoose Mountain Centre and the Smiddy Bunkhouse. REDCAT IT of Fort William has undertaken the technical development and the project is supported by Lochaber Ambassadors for Tourism Excellence, Lochaber College and OCUK and Lochaber Ltd.

If you would like to ensure that your interest or activity in relation to this sector is included please get in touch with Tina on info@adventure-captial.co.uk tel: 01397 77246.

May is Wildlife month in the London Office

VisitScotland's office in Cockspur Street, London will host two displays throughout May, a Thistle Parks display and a Speyside Wildlife display. Both parties have paid to take advantage of the display space and to have their literature displayed prominently in the centre. The London office will also be running a wildlife competition, organised by the Group Brand Team, inviting people who come into the centre during the month of May to enter the competition to win a wildlife holiday in Scotland. The office's new plasma window and internal screens will also run information and advertising for all interested Scottish trade, this of course is another paid for opportunity.

Finally, the month will end on Friday 27 May, with our monthly free whisky tasting session from 1-1.30pm. For more information on the London Office and its opportunities, please contact lisa-rose.moller@visitscotland.com

VisitScotland Challenge Fund - Round Two of Applications

A reminder that businesses can now apply for round two of the VisitScotland Challenge Fund. The deadline for the second round of applications is 30 June 2005.

Groups of businesses can bid into this fund to help them with new or innovative marketing projects that complement how Scotland is marketed both nationally and locally. Funding contributions of between £2,500 and £50,000 will be available for successful proposals.

For Further information on the VisitScotland Challenge Fund please visit http://www.scotexchange.net/businessdevelopment/ecommerce_growth_-_businessdevelopment_-_funding/challenge_fund.htm

Country Sports Tourism in Scotland

Scotland is widely recognised as the birthplace of many of the world's premier country sports, which are an integral part of Scotland's national culture. It is estimated that the value of country sports tourism to Scotland is in the region of £200m per year. In the UK there are over 4 million country sports participants, with many more overseas, including 38 million in the USA.

In 2004, the Country Sports Tourism Group commissioned a research project, full results of which are on www.scotexchange.net/countrysports

Funding has been secured for a Country Sports Development Group and the project is likely to be launched at the Game Fair at Scone Palace on 1 July 2005.

International Culinary Tourism Association (ICTA)

Erick Wolf, President of the International Culinary Tourism Association, has agreed to bring the Association's annual conference to Scotland in 2006 following a visit to Scotland. VisitScotland co-ordinated a familiarisation trip so that Erick could assess Scotland's suitability for hosting the annual conference.

Scotland is a key sponsor of this year's ICTA conference in San Francisco and we are working on a communications programme for the event. Further details can be found at www.culinarytourism.org

If you are interested in participating in next year's event in Scotland, please contact:
Ewan Fairweather, Sector Development Manager,Email: ewan.fairweather@visitscotland.com

Market Research

The Business Tourism Unit is always looking into ways to improve its service and attract more business to Scotland, which is why it has implemented an ongoing research survey that will supply us with key information on trends within the Scottish industry.

Our survey will collect information on meetings and conferences, including number of delegates, type of event and origin of delegates. For the first time ever, we hope to get a true picture of the size of the conference market in Scotland and the sectors within it.Some of you may have been approached already to participate in this research; if you haven't, taking part should only take about 5 minutes of your time every 3 months and your feedback would be completely confidential.

If you would like to take part, please contact: businesstourism@visitscotland.com for more information.

Welcome to the 2005 Scottish Thistle Awards.

Entries are now being sought for this year's awards from all tourism industry sectors. We all market our product, develop our staff, serve the customer and a play an active part in raising the quality and standards within our industry. There is a category for everyone.
The Scottish Thistle Awards are open to all types of businesses and are widely recognised as the industry's ultimate accolade. They have been rewarding excellence and quality in the industry for over ten years, and businesses the length and breadth of Scotland can testify to the benefits of being an award winner.

The aim of the awards are:

• To reward excellence in Scotland's tourism industry in all areas and at all levels.
  
• To encouraging professionalism, innovation and creative thinking within the industry.
  
• To promoting quality service and products that truly reflect all that is best in Scotland's world reputed and foremost industry.
  
• To create a memorable celebration of this excellence and a major social gathering for Scotland's tourism providers.

For full details on the award categories and entry information visit www.scotexchange.net, telephone 0131 557 5789 or Email sta@eventconsultants.com

VisitScotland Stakeholder Survey Uncovers Widespread Support for Tourism Industry

A new survey commissioned by VisitScotland’s Strategy & Communications directorate has uncovered a welter of widespread support for the agency and strong national confidence in the tourism industry as a whole.

The survey, which questioned 100 key stakeholders from the media, the tourism industry, the business community and MSPs; together with 1000 members of the public, was first commissioned three years ago to assess the impact of VisitScotland’s messages and marketing themes together with gauging public perceptions of the wider industry.

In some of the most important findings, nine out of ten Scottish adults agreed that tourism has an impact on most businesses with a similar percentage of stakeholders ranking tourism amongst the top three most important sectors.

In addition, eight out of ten stakeholders were aware of the industry ambition to grow tourism revenue by 50% over 10 years with a similar number agreeing that this ambition was likely to be achieved.

Almost three quarters of tourism businesses and four out of five non tourism businesses agreed that VisitScotland is highly reputable, with well over half Scotland’s media community, when questioned, agreeing that VisitScotland is a dynamic and forward thinking organisation.

Welcoming the findings of the survey, VisitScotland Chief Executive, Philip Riddle, said,

“This is excellent news for Scotland’s tourism industry and for VisitScotland. I am especially pleased to see that our shared industry targets and the messages which go with them are, not only, being articulated clearly but more importantly, received clearly.

“As Scotland's largest industry, it is essential that tourism delivers against its strategic targets and garners credibility and respect from across Scottish society.

“What is equally important, given these impressive findings, is that we see them as only a foothold, and move forward together to shape an ever more dynamic tourism industry imbued with quality, innovation and dynamism.

“ The benefits of a dynamic approach to marketing Scotland are now becoming clear but also the enormous potential for further growth. It is going to be important to consolidate and improve on the findings however there are a clear signals that tourism in Scotland is a major success story”

Further findings from the Stakeholder Survey will be available on www.scotexchange.net under VisitScotland in the Tourism Organisations section.