carrefour
New Member
Toronto selling itself as full package for gay travellers
More than just a place to get married, Toronto aiming to compete as a destination for same-sex vacationers
JENNIFER LEWINGTON
From Monday's Globe and Mail
November 17, 2008 at 4:37 AM EST
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20081117.wtourism17/BNStory/National/home
It's not just about the wedding chapel any more, as Toronto steps up efforts to attract gay and lesbian tourists.
Despite setbacks for same-sex unions in the United States - this month California reinstated a ban on gay marriage - Toronto as a city to tie the knot in is not the key message.
"Marriage is one thing that has positioned Toronto well, but it is beyond inviting gay travellers to come here to get married," says Andrew Weir, vice-president of communications for Tourism Toronto. "We are not saying, 'Come see our gay village.' We are saying, 'Come see our destination which has all the things sophisticated travellers look for.' "
Over the past three years, the largely industry-funded visitor and convention bureau has tripled its budget aimed at gays to almost $500,000 this year.
Typical of the result of marketing the entire city as a destination is San Francisco resident Alfred Hu, a computer programmer on a return visit to Toronto this week.
He chose to stay at the Banting House Inn, a gay-friendly bed and breakfast near Church and Wellesley streets, using it as a base to explore ethnic neighbourhoods, check out Honest Ed's, take in a play and wrap up his stay with a trip to the Art Gallery of Ontario, which just reopened. "It's a city I can come back to again and again," says Mr. Hu, who last visited two years ago.
In taking on Montreal and Vancouver for more gay visitors - who typically stay longer, spend more and are freer to plan trips throughout the year - Toronto scored big by snagging the International Gay and Lesbian Travel Association convention for the first time next May. The event is expected to draw 500 members from 25 countries.
"Toronto is a very desirable city for the community because of all the things it has to offer: culture, a large local [gay] community and easy side trips to Niagara and Ottawa," says John Tanzella, executive director of IGLTA. "It is very appealing."
What clinched the deal, he says, was the city's diverse events and close collaboration with local gay businesses.
It was not always that way.
In 2003, Toronto council's only openly gay member, Kyle Rae, blasted officials for ignoring the gay travel market.
Today, he heads a gay advisory panel for Tourism Toronto and led the successful sales pitch to the IGLTA.
As well, the arrival last year of David Whitaker, a former top official of the Greater Miami Convention and Visitor Bureau (in stiff competition with Ft. Lauderdale for gay visitors), as president of Tourism Toronto signalled a sharper focus on the gay travel market.
As a result, Toronto has tapped significant subgroups of the gay travel market, says Bruce McDonald, co-founder of the Canadian Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce.
"There are 300 gay and lesbian sporting events and conferences that move around on international basis," he says. "This was a market no one had looked at before."
The Prime Timers, a social group for gay men over 40 with more than 60 chapters across North America, arrive in July, with the International Gay Rodeo Association in October. Both cases are examples of Toronto building a word-of-mouth reputation among gays.
"In the U.S., they still don't know we have a climate here where we get warm in the summer, but they do know about the marriage issue here," says Mr. McDonald.
On other fronts, Tourism Toronto has joined with the Church Wellesley Village Business Improvement Area to market a new event to an international audience. This year, the agency put up $30,000 for "Hallow Week," the BIA's week-long festival of food, film and fun now in its second year, which draws 55,000 people on Halloween night.
"It has been hugely beneficial for us," says BIA co-ordinator David Wootton, whose organization put up $25,000. Tourism Toronto marketed the event in the U.S. and England.
Once gay visitors get a taste of Toronto, says Banting House Inn co-owner David Hyde, the city sells itself.
On one occasion, he says the bed and breakfast - gay-friendly but open to straight visitors - had two sets of newly weds, one gay, one straight, at the breakfast table.
"It was a little quiet at first but the next day they were showing each other pictures and they went out to dinner together," he says. "That is what Toronto is all about."
*****
My opinion is: Bring on the Gay Dollars. And if vacationing Mormons are an untapped resource, give me them Mormon Dollars too. And I ain't against the Black, the Jew, the American, the WASP, the French and the Extraterrestrial Dollars either. Give me any Dollars. Dollars is Dollars.
More than just a place to get married, Toronto aiming to compete as a destination for same-sex vacationers
JENNIFER LEWINGTON
From Monday's Globe and Mail
November 17, 2008 at 4:37 AM EST
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20081117.wtourism17/BNStory/National/home
It's not just about the wedding chapel any more, as Toronto steps up efforts to attract gay and lesbian tourists.
Despite setbacks for same-sex unions in the United States - this month California reinstated a ban on gay marriage - Toronto as a city to tie the knot in is not the key message.
"Marriage is one thing that has positioned Toronto well, but it is beyond inviting gay travellers to come here to get married," says Andrew Weir, vice-president of communications for Tourism Toronto. "We are not saying, 'Come see our gay village.' We are saying, 'Come see our destination which has all the things sophisticated travellers look for.' "
Over the past three years, the largely industry-funded visitor and convention bureau has tripled its budget aimed at gays to almost $500,000 this year.
Typical of the result of marketing the entire city as a destination is San Francisco resident Alfred Hu, a computer programmer on a return visit to Toronto this week.
He chose to stay at the Banting House Inn, a gay-friendly bed and breakfast near Church and Wellesley streets, using it as a base to explore ethnic neighbourhoods, check out Honest Ed's, take in a play and wrap up his stay with a trip to the Art Gallery of Ontario, which just reopened. "It's a city I can come back to again and again," says Mr. Hu, who last visited two years ago.
In taking on Montreal and Vancouver for more gay visitors - who typically stay longer, spend more and are freer to plan trips throughout the year - Toronto scored big by snagging the International Gay and Lesbian Travel Association convention for the first time next May. The event is expected to draw 500 members from 25 countries.
"Toronto is a very desirable city for the community because of all the things it has to offer: culture, a large local [gay] community and easy side trips to Niagara and Ottawa," says John Tanzella, executive director of IGLTA. "It is very appealing."
What clinched the deal, he says, was the city's diverse events and close collaboration with local gay businesses.
It was not always that way.
In 2003, Toronto council's only openly gay member, Kyle Rae, blasted officials for ignoring the gay travel market.
Today, he heads a gay advisory panel for Tourism Toronto and led the successful sales pitch to the IGLTA.
As well, the arrival last year of David Whitaker, a former top official of the Greater Miami Convention and Visitor Bureau (in stiff competition with Ft. Lauderdale for gay visitors), as president of Tourism Toronto signalled a sharper focus on the gay travel market.
As a result, Toronto has tapped significant subgroups of the gay travel market, says Bruce McDonald, co-founder of the Canadian Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce.
"There are 300 gay and lesbian sporting events and conferences that move around on international basis," he says. "This was a market no one had looked at before."
The Prime Timers, a social group for gay men over 40 with more than 60 chapters across North America, arrive in July, with the International Gay Rodeo Association in October. Both cases are examples of Toronto building a word-of-mouth reputation among gays.
"In the U.S., they still don't know we have a climate here where we get warm in the summer, but they do know about the marriage issue here," says Mr. McDonald.
On other fronts, Tourism Toronto has joined with the Church Wellesley Village Business Improvement Area to market a new event to an international audience. This year, the agency put up $30,000 for "Hallow Week," the BIA's week-long festival of food, film and fun now in its second year, which draws 55,000 people on Halloween night.
"It has been hugely beneficial for us," says BIA co-ordinator David Wootton, whose organization put up $25,000. Tourism Toronto marketed the event in the U.S. and England.
Once gay visitors get a taste of Toronto, says Banting House Inn co-owner David Hyde, the city sells itself.
On one occasion, he says the bed and breakfast - gay-friendly but open to straight visitors - had two sets of newly weds, one gay, one straight, at the breakfast table.
"It was a little quiet at first but the next day they were showing each other pictures and they went out to dinner together," he says. "That is what Toronto is all about."
*****
My opinion is: Bring on the Gay Dollars. And if vacationing Mormons are an untapped resource, give me them Mormon Dollars too. And I ain't against the Black, the Jew, the American, the WASP, the French and the Extraterrestrial Dollars either. Give me any Dollars. Dollars is Dollars.
