LITTLE CURRENT—Northeastern Ontario Tourism (formerly RTO 13A), the agency that promotes tourism in the part of Northern Ontario containing Manitoulin, hosted an International Market Readiness Workshop for Northeast Ontario operators at the Anchor Inn Hotel conference room on Thursday, October 27.
“Today we are hosting an international travel trade workshop with some of our key operators here on Manitoulin Island,” said Northeastern Ontario Tourism Executive Director Donna McLeod during a brief break in the busy agenda. “We are building alliances and looking at product a different way as to how we can work together to present a product to the international market.”
The workshop was facilitated by international tourism veterans Barbara Ferrell and Bruce Burnett of Ferrell and Partners Marketing Inc.
Ms. Ferrell is a seasoned hospitality marketing and sales executive with over 20 years at Canadian Pacific Hotels and Fairmont Hotels and Resorts where she gained extensive experience in the North American and international tourism markets. Ms. Ferrell’s specialty is found in “identifying and developing new business opportunities, product and niche markets” and she is “equally adept at drafting sound marketing strategies and implementation plans.”
Mr. Burnett brought the global experience he has garnered in developing tourism programs and packages in Switzerland, Japan, the Middle East and Canada as well as his experience as president of Horizon Holidays and as a vice-president at global tourism giant Jonview. Mr. Burnett’s forte is in “developing complex, multi-week cultural tourism programs as well as shorter two- and three-night travel packages for discerning tourism clients.” Mr. Burnett was also “instrumental in the development of the Rideau Heritage route, a supporting stakeholder-component in the UNESCO inscription of the Rideau Canal. Mr. Burnett is also currently the operator of Franklin and Frobisher Travel Service, which develops package holidays for European visitors to Canada.
“Today we are working with Northeastern Ontario Tourism and their important partners on Manitoulin who are interested in attracting some new visitors from some overseas markets and part of what we have been engaged to do is to work with the industry, helping them to understand what these visitors are all about, what kinds of things they are interested in when they are considering a visit to Northern Ontario and specifically Manitoulin Island,” said Ms. Ferrell, “and then give them all of the guidelines and parameters that are involved in working with the travel industry partners who develop and sell programs in the markets we are interested in. In this case the UK and Germany.”
Part of what the consultants were doing during the workshop was showing the Island partners the criteria that they had developed with Northeastern Ontario Tourism that will equip with the knowledge operators to be successful. “Our mission here is to set everyone up to attract new visitors to stay longer, spend more time here to increase the revenue and improve the economy here on Manitoulin,” said Ms. Ferrell. “Our mission here is to improve the economy here on Manitoulin and in Northeastern Ontario.”
