Wed 4 Jan 2012
Cape Town Tourism goes on holiday, contrary to its advertising slogan!
Posted by Chris von Ulmenstein under Cape Town, Chris von Ulmenstein, Stellenbosch, Tourism news, Whale Cottage Portfolio, Winelands
Two months ago Cape Town Tourism launched its new Ogilvy-developed advertising campaign, with the slogan ‘You don’t need a holiday, you need Cape Town’. It would appear that this slogan has not been supported by the Cape Town Tourism staff, most of whom have been on holiday over the festive period!
Seeing Cape Town Tourism CEO Mariette du Toit-Helmbold Tweet from her Pringle Bay ‘holiday shack’, as she calls it, a year ago I was astounded that our city’s tourism bureau could close down its management over the period during which Cape Town is at its fullest. Sadly, this is true too of Cape Town Routes Unlimited, marketing the Western Cape. Mrs Helmbold is on maternity leave until the end of April, so can justify her time off this year. The Communications Manager Skye Grove took a trip to the Cederberg region between Christmas and New Year, she communicated on Twitter, and the new Marketing Manager Velma Corcoran is still on leave, despite only having started with the organisation in September, surprising then that she has leave to take already!
As I have not seen a Cape Town Tourism media release for a while, the last one having been the poorly written one about the tourism performance in November, I visited the Cape Town Tourism website yesterday, and noted the following:
1. The grammar-deficient media release is still on the website, with ‘warts’ and all, and was the last media release issued, more than three weeks ago. Given the good tourism performance over the festive period, one would have thought that Cape Town Tourism could have written about this, and proactively supplied the paper-thin newspapers with material about Cape Town, to share with their out-of-town readers!
2. The website contains an outdated list of accommodation ‘Winters are Cool’ specials!
3. Blogposts on the Cape Town Tourism Blog on the website contain typing errors, if there is any writing at all, as most blogposts are a Flickr pic of the day!
4. The biggest surprise was the poor content of the ‘Beyond Cape Town’ pages, in that
* there is no mention of the attractions in Stellenbosch, the largest, oldest and most visible wine region in our country, in the Cape Winelands sub-section! Wine estate names are misspelled, and the wine estates mentioned are in Stellenbosch, but are not identified as being in this town, looking as if they could be in Franschhoek from the text!
* in the Cape Overberg section, there is no mention of the Hermanus Wine Route (and not to be found in the Cape Winelands section either), focusing only on the whales for Hermanus. Hermanus suffers badly outside of the whale watching period, and its excellent wines could be an important means of bringing tourists and locals to the town from December - May in particular.
5. In her ‘From the CEO’ statement on the website, Mrs Helmbold announces her five month maternity leave, with Enver Duminy heading up the operation in her absence. Interesting is that Mrs Helmbold finally acknowledges that 2011 was ‘one of the toughest years for tourism’, having tried to counter our blogposts about this crisis months ago. Badly written, her statement suggests that ‘there is some optimism in the air’! Mrs Helmbold does not reveal her organisation’s goals and marketing plans for 2012, but writes that ‘we have been soul-searching, and have worn our hearts on our sleeves’, an interesting and innovative marketing planning approach! Could the Communications Manager not have corrected the poor writing, one would ask, but then she is on Twitter continuously, having little time to do any other communication work for Cape Town Tourism, it would appear!
Cape Town Tourism receives R40 million from the City of Cape Town, money which is generated from the ratepayers of Cape Town. Grant Pascoe, the (DA) City Councillor responsible for the Tourism and Events portfolios on the mayoral committee, has a most annoying habit of ignoring all e-mails, telephonic messages, and Tweets directed at him, and one wonders how the City can justify the wasted expenditure of some of the projects which Cape Town Tourism sponsored in 2011, and in not delivering on marketing Cape Town, as little marketing is likely in the next four months of Mrs Helmbold’s absence!
POSTSCRIPT 5/1: Enver Duminy, Acting CEO of Cape Town Tourism, replied today, after I called him and he read the blogpost we wrote today about the non-reaction to this blogpost: “I would like to thank you for bringing some of your website comments to my attention, and the team have been tasked to review your points and amend spelling errors and remove expired content where and when possible, and as appropriate. Thank you for highlighting the “Beyond Cape Town” sections, which the team will look into, and with the support our LTO and RTO colleagues in the regions, provide us with updated content to populate as such”.
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage
January 4th, 2012 at 12:00 pm
Compliments of the Season to you and yours Chris. Although I shut down the computer for the past two weeks, while taking on the granny role in life, I noticed you have diligently held your fort.
This article is actually quite mind blowing - just to see the neglect and the apathy on the part of our local tourism body is quite startling. Particularly as you point out that they are upheld by the City’s monies. I have to ask myself, as I am sure you do -” what will it take for them to get to the place where this apathy is shaken off and the promotion of our city’s tourism taken more seriously?” I am sure that as a hospitality operator, it must be a real source of frustration for you and many others.
Although it is tough to read an article that exposes and challenges the modus operandi of our tourism bodies, I for one am grateful that there is someone such as yourself, willing to put yourself ‘out there’ and take up the challenge of creating this public awareness.
January 4th, 2012 at 5:28 pm
Happy New Year to you too Rose, and thank you for your kind words.
I don’t understand that the message is not getting to the City - I have heard that Grant Pascoe needs to defend his reputation, and that is why he will not enter into a dialogue with me - not the mature and professional way in which to manage so much of our ratepayers’ monies. I may need to go to the media next. The Board of Cape Town Tourism ultimately is accountable, and should be fired if it is allowing this wastage to occur.
Chris
January 5th, 2012 at 8:24 am
You don’t need a holiday, You need Cape Town. Then Cape Town Tourism should please explain why some of its employees had to get away from Cape Town for their holidays…
Excuse me while I jamb another foot in my mouth.
January 5th, 2012 at 9:36 am
My point exactly Dave.
I checked their website last night, hoping that my ‘pearls of wisdom’ may have embarrassed them into making corrections, but nothing has changed!
Chris
January 5th, 2012 at 10:36 am
I do work on a big production job for a documentary right now. Also one of those things which could potentially be great free PR for Cape Town, but not only the tourism office, but also all major marketing people from main tourist attractions i.e. Robben Island are away during high season. Maybe next restaurants will close because they want to have summer holidays too for their employees…
January 5th, 2012 at 10:48 am
Let’s add guest houses and hotels too! An absolute joke.
I read about a city centre restaurant, which only opened in December, closing after two weeks, because the city centre was dead, and her suppliers couldn’t service her. She is only re-opening on 9 January.
All the tourists come to Cape Town, have heard about our special restaurants and artisan suppliers (e.g. Honest Chocolate, Haas), yet they have been closed over the festive days.
Best of all is that the City of Cape Town management too is on leave, especially Grant Pascoe, our Tourism Councillor! Even though he answered his cellphone today, he could not talk to me because he is on leave, even if it affects Cape Town Tourism!
Chris
January 5th, 2012 at 2:55 pm
A good ole South African cliche and comment in response to Grant Pascoe’s holiday situation: “Ag No Man!!”
January 6th, 2012 at 10:15 am
Marketing is about creating awareness, and there is no reason for the senior people in Tourism not to take a holiday; as they are not required to be at the shopfront during peak season. What is much more important is whether the visitors information centres were open, staffed and available to assist visitors during the holidays.
January 6th, 2012 at 11:46 am
I don’t deny the tourism management a holiday at all - it’s the timing that I have a problem with!
Not one tourism official went on holiday during the World Cup last year, yet during this festive period, when Cape Town was busier than during the World Cup, they were all away, even the Marketing departments that you write about!
Chris
January 9th, 2012 at 9:26 am
Dear Chris,
don’t despair - The German TV Station RTL is showing since last Wednesday the series “The Bachelor”. It was filmed in Cape Town and shows for the next few weeks during prime time to millions of Germans how beautiful Cape Town is.
January 9th, 2012 at 10:04 am
Thank you Dagmar and excellent news.
I will definitely look out for it.
Tschuess
Chris