When Visit Isle of Wight Ltd was created in October 2012, its priority mission was to attract new visitors to the Isle of Wight and encourage more of them to stay overnight (thus spending more in the local economy).
Three full years after the start of that activity we can now clearly see the impact of the organisation in terms of attracting new people to the Island.
£6.8 million direct impact
These new visitors (approx 80,000 of them) have mainly come from high demographic groups in and around London and the home counties.
Their contribution to the Island’s visitor economy between Jan 2014 and Dec 2015 was around £6.8 million (direct impact).
David Thornton, CEO of Visit Isle of Wight explains,
“This graph clearly shows the negative impact of fragmentation across the industry between 2009 and 2012, but also demonstrates the impact of VisitWight very clearly.
“By attracting first time Island visitors we are improving the Island’s sustainable customer base not just for this year but for many years to come. Around 60% of new visitors become regulars and come back every year or so.
“A very significant proportion, more than 28%, appear to come back more than once a year, so growing our first time customer base brings the very best return on marketing investment for the Island”
