TOURISM New Zealand (TNZ) and Air New Zealand have renewed their marketing partnership for another year with a joint fund of NZ$20 million (US$17.2 million) to spend on promotions.
Signed by the chiefs of both organisations this morning, the agreement will see New Zealand take aim at key markets such as South-east Asia and back Air New Zealand’s proposed alliance with Singapore Airlines (TTG Asia e-Daily, January 16, 2014).
Each party will invest NZ$10 million each over the next 12 months for marketing in Australia, China, Hong Kong, Japan, the US and Europe, targeting high-end and MICE travellers.
Air New Zealand chief executive, Christopher Luxon, said the extension allows both bodies to build on the success of their initial agreement.
“Working together to capitalise on this momentum is a natural progression which will positively impact New Zealand’s tourism industry and is a wonderful example of collaboration which supports the Tourism Industry Association’s Tourism 25 framework for growth (TTG Asia e-Daily, May 19, 2014) ,” said Luxon.
“Our joint activity to market The Hobbit films overseas has been very successful. The most recent campaign resulted in not only strong fare sales but also showed the activity really resonated with our target audiences with a recent survey showing 14 per cent of holiday arrivals were influenced to travel to New Zealand by the movies,” he elaborated.
TNZ chief executive, Kevin Bowler, said arrivals to New Zealand are up more than five per cent to 2.8 million international visitors in the year ending March, mostly from key markets where joint marketing took place such as China, Europe, the US, India and Indonesia.
