Qantas signs deal to promote NSW tourism
Qantas has signed a major new deal with the New South Wales government intended to boost tourism in the state.
The new AU$30 million (US$31m) partnership was signed at Sydney Airport on Monday 22 April 2013 by NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell and Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce, and will see the two parties work together for a period of three years, promoting the Australian state in Qantas’ main international markets. It is the largest tourism marketing partnership in NSW’s history.
“This partnership with Qantas is the cornerstone of our strategy to increase tourism to NSW, providing a boost to our economy and helping to create more,” said O’Farrell. “We will be aggressively targeting big spending leisure and business travellers from overseas which will be a boon for our hotels, restaurants and retail sector.
“This will build on our standing as the nation’s leader for international visitation and expenditure and the preferred destination for key emerging markets,” he added.
The agreement will see Qantas match the NSW government dollar for dollar, creating promotional campaigns to attract more international visitors from key source markets including the US, UK, Europe, China, Southeast Asia, Japan and New Zealand. Both the NSW government and Qantas will invest AU$15m over the three years in international advertising and marketing campaigns, marketing activities around major events and joint PR activities. There will also be a strong focus on digital platforms, including social media. The first joint campaigns are expected to be rolled out in September in multiple markets.
“Sydney is the gateway to Australia with more than 50% of all international visitors to Australia arriving at Sydney Airport so it’s fitting this is the largest partnership we have ever entered into with a state government,” said Joyce. “We have seen a fantastic and tangible response to work we have done with Destination NSW in the past and we think working more closely will result in more people visiting NSW and flying Qantas.”
Qantas now serves 20 international destinations from Sydney, and more than 150 including its new codeshare partners such as Emirates. In 2012, the airline brought 1.2m visitors to NSW.