Australians urged to embrace domestic travel

Tourism Australia says families are particularly important to be convinced that There's nothing like Australia for their next holiday as they represent a significant part of the annual overall tourism expenditure and have increasingly been taking overseas trips.

The nation's peak travel marketing organisation acknowledges it has a major role to play to raise consumer awareness, implant knowledge about tourist sites and attractions and encourage a desire among all Australians to see their own country.

Tourism Australia managing director Andrew McEvoy maintains by holidaying at home families can do their bit to help keep 900,000 or more Australians employed as the industry works toward meeting its 2020 growth target.

"Domestic tourism is a critical segment of Australian tourism and the need exists to encourage Australians to see and experience the remarkable destinations within their own country," he says.

To help achieve this new phase of Tourism Australia's global marketing campaign There's nothing like Australia will run in Australia and will target people aged between 30 and 54, many with one to three children.

Research conducted for Tourism Australia this year showed that the greatest volume of travel and one of the largest growth groups travelling overseas year on year are Australian families.

To stem this trend to go offshore will require greater domestic industry support to challenge these travel trends. As part of the next phase of its There's nothing like Australia campaign, Tourism Australia will conduct a multi-media blitz and hope to inspire families to holiday at home by highlighting the many unique experiences that a traditional Australian holiday offers.

Co-operative marketing activity with partner offers commenced in Fairfax media on Saturday June 9 and will continue in a number of additional media channels throughout June and into July 2012.

This is not a new strategy. It is one that has been a focus over the past 12 months and encouragingly there are positive signs for the domestic market which makes up 65 per cent of the A$76.5 billion total tourism expenditure for the year ending March 2011.

In the latest National Visitor Survey (NVS), released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday June 13, 2012, domestic tourism showed double digit growth in total spend up 10.4 per cent year-on-year (spend per night up four per cent; spend per visitor up 4.7 per cent; nights up 6.1 per cent; and visitors up 5.4 per cent).