Tuesday, 04 September 2007

ST.HELENS SECURES TOURISM SOCIETY 2008 CONFERENCE

St.Helens has been unveiled as the venue for the prestigious 2008 Tourism Society Annual Conference, to be held in conjunction with St.Helens Council from Thursday 19th -Friday 20th June 2008 with the theme of 'Emerging Markets in Tourism'.

The Tourism Society is the leading membership organisation for tourism professionals, with over 1000 members in the UK and overseas. It holds its annual conference in a different destination every year, with previous host locations including, Aviemore ( Scotland ), Nottingham, Liverpool, and Greenwich ( London ).

The conference will feature a number of keynote speakers from the tourism industry, government, and public sector bodies. The "Emerging Markets in Tourism" theme will cover topics such as business tourism (conferences & exhibitions), sports tourism, gay tourism and cultural tourism.

Dickon White, Chairman of the St.Helens Tourism Business Network and Managing Director of Haydock Park Racecourse comments: "It is a great coup for St.Helens that the Tourism Society has elected to hold its 2008 annual conference here. This certainly reflects the tremendous drive, passion, and commitment that characterises the local tourism industry, and, thanks to close partnership working between the public and private sectors at all levels, has resulted in St.Helens' growing profile as a regional visitor destination.

This is also a great opportunity to showcase to the national tourism industry not only what St.Helens has to offer, but also to profile the rest of Merseyside and the North West in the year that neighbouring Liverpool will be the European Capital of Culture."

Flo Powell, Executive Director of The Tourism Society adds; "The Tourism Society selected St.Helens to host our 2008 conference because the Borough has a great story to tell that I have no doubt will be of interest and benefit to other destinations across the country.

From a position six or so years ago where it had no association with tourism whatsoever, St.Helens is now cited by the Northwest Development Agency as an example to others in terms of its approach to tourism development. This has been achieved by maximising its existing assets, capitalising on new opportunities and emerging markets, exploiting its prime connectivity at the heart of the North West , and working incredibly hard with local private sector operators and public agencies such as The Mersey Partnership and NWDA.

I would urge all to come and find out more about the Borough's remarkable transformation first hand, at the same time as hearing about wider regional and national developments and taking advantage of excellent networking opportunities at what is one of the major conferences of the year for the tourism industry."

Sponsorship Opportunities for Local Businesses:

There are plenty of sponsorship opportunities, including in-kind and financial packages available so that local businesses can raise their profile during the event. For details of the how you can get involved by sponsoring part of the event, please contact Flo Powell, Executive Director of the Tourism Society, on 020 8661 4636 or Email Flo.

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