Action for Attractions

The challenges

Attractions are facing severe challenges, not least from activities outside the field of traditional tourism. These challenges have direct implications for the quality of the visitor experience – an issue of fundamental importance for every attraction. In particular, the operators in the industry are concerned with the following:

• Demand for attractions is slowing. Although the overall number of visits has grown by 14% over the last ten years (1989-99), the increase in visits in the previous decade (1979-89) was 24% (see Figure 1 below).
• The average number of visits per attraction is declining, yet supply is increasing, indicating that supply may be outstripping demand (see Figure 2).
• There is increasing competition for consumer leisure time and spend, with the relaxation of restrictions on Sunday trading and the increase in Sunday sports eating into, and providing alternatives to, what was traditionally the peak visit day for attractions.
• There is greater pressure on people's time – today's consumers are increasingly 'cash rich/time poor', with value of time and convenience often driving purchasing behaviour.
• Consumer expectations are rising – there is less interest in simply observing and more demand for interaction and involvement.
• Attraction prices have been increasing much faster than inflation (the average adult admission price has risen by 117% compared with a 43% increase in the retail price index over the last ten years). Increases in the cost of petrol have added to the cost of visiting attractions hard to reach by public transport.
• Domestic holiday patterns are changing, with a trend away from long holidays in the UK towards short breaks and visits to friends and relatives (which generally yield a lower level of attraction visiting than long holidays).
• The number of European visitors has recently been declining.
• Lottery and EU funding has stimulated an increase in the supply of new attractions.
• Private sector attractions (which are largely not eligible for Lottery funding) are struggling to raise private investment.
• The government's free/reduced price admissions policy at national museums and galleries is likely to displace some visitors from admission-charging attractions.
• There is uncertainty over the potential effect on local authority attractions (which are a discretionary service) of requirements to demonstrate 'Best Value' in service provision.

Figure 1

Source: Survey of Visits to Tourist Attractions, 1999

Figure 2

Source: Survey of Visits to Tourist Attractions, 1999

The attractions sector in England

England's 4,500 visitor attractions:

• span a diverse range, including farms, steam railways and theme parks, historic properties and gardens, museums and galleries, country parks and wildlife attractions, visitor centres and workplace attractions;
• have come into being for a variety of different reasons, including:
  • preservation of the country's heritage, culture and environment,
  • to enhance local facilities for residents and attract tourism,
  • as catalysts for economic regeneration,
  • to generate additional income for historic properties, farms and manufacturing plants,
  • entertainment;
• are generally owned and operated by the private sector and not-for-profit organisations. The public sector – government agencies and local authorities – makes up only a third of attraction owners;
• are mostly small businesses – 57% attract fewer than 20,000 visits a year but account for only 6% of total visits to attractions (see Figure 3);
• around 40% do not charge for admission – such attractions account for 55% of visits (see Figure 4);
• tend to have a high proportion of fixed costs and narrow operating margins, leaving little money for reinvestment in the product;
• operate below capacity most of the time – only 28% of attractions hit maximum capacity levels, and that occurs on only a few days a year (on average 13 days of 248 days open);
• are usually seasonal outside the main urban areas;
• are often reliant on the services of volunteers. Around 46% use volunteers, although this ranges from 87% of steam railways to 9% of workplaces. Attractions use the services of an estimated 72,400 volunteers, of which 42% work at historic properties and 28% at museums and galleries;
• lack a single voice. The sector is fragmented in terms of representation, with a wide variety of trade associations focusing on the particular needs of their memberships.

Figure 3

Source: Survey of Visits to Tourist Attractions, 1999

Figure 4

Source: Survey of Visits to Tourist Attractions, 1999

Some sub-sectors have fared better than others over the past decade (see Figure 5 and Table 1), including:

• government-owned attractions,
• those offering free admission,
• those opened since 1980,
• those attracting a high proportion of overseas visitors.

Figure 5

Source: Survey of Visits to Tourist Attractions, 1999

Overcoming these challenges requires action on many levels and the concerted involvement of public and private sector operators, with support and guidance from the tourist boards, national training organisations, local authorities, government departments and the sector's many associations. Below are described the main areas where action is required, together with the measures recommended to improve the long-term viability and quality of the sector.

Improving market understanding

Supply indicators

Current statistics on attractions' supply and visitor demand are insufficient. Supply information and market measurement needs to be more comprehensive and reliable, provide greater sub-sector analysis and be disseminated more widely and quickly, and in a more usable format.

In England, the ETC has the primary responsibility to commission and/or co-ordinate annually both the collection of data from attractions for central information database purposes (via the joint ETC/RTB Places to Visit questionnaire) and for market measurement (via the Survey of Visits to Tourist Attractions).

Greater involvement and co-operation is needed from all attractions to enable monitoring of openings and closures, improve data quality, depth of information about the sector and speed of turnaround of results.

RTBs also carry out a number of research programmes with attractions, such as visitor satisfaction surveys. There is scope for commonality of core questions, in order to provide an opportunity for comparison across larger sample sizes, enabling greater subsectoral and geographical comparisons.

Consumer demand indicators

Visitor attractions succeed or fail on their ability to attract and satisfy visitors. Current surveys of the overall level of demand are, however, limited. There is no doubt that attractions would benefit from a regular, comprehensive demand survey. This would assist new development decisions and help Lottery distributors and developers.

As demand for attractions has slowed, there is particular interest in discovering more about the awareness and motivations of visitors who do not visit attractions. Just as the Government's tourism strategy, Tomorrow's Tourism, identified the need to conduct further research among people who do not take holidays, so, any social and accessibility barriers to attraction visits need to be examined.

Main recommendations

• ETC will seek new tenders for the main industry source of attraction statistics, the Survey of Visits to Tourist Attractions and the report Sightseeing in the UK. As part of this process, ways to address the perceived weaknesses of the current statistics will be sought. These will be reported to DCMS for discussion.
• ETC will discuss with DCMS how demand for attractions could be measured more reliably and regularly – possibly through an expanded Leisure Day Visits Survey – and the cost implications.
• There should be greater sector participation in the commissioning and funding of attractions research.

Increasing visitor satisfaction

In order to survive, visitor attractions must draw and satisfy visitors. Some attractions are purpose built and intended to do just that. However, many were originally created for other purposes and have become, by choice or necessity, 'attractions', almost always needing the revenue from visitors to defray the costs of their continuing existence.

Rising standards of living

With rising standards of living, increasing familiarity with new technology and improved standards of facilities and experiences in other service outlets, visitors' expectations are rising. While some attractions can constantly update or change their content to maintain a fresh appeal to visitors, such capital-intensive changes are not acceptable or realistically possible for many heritage, cultural and environmental attractions.

For them, improvements in presentation are often the only means to maintain competitive appeal. The small-scale nature of many attractions means it can be difficult for them to keep abreast of best practice elsewhere and to see how they compare. Wider dissemination of information and guidance is needed on:

• best practice in information provision, presentation/interpretation techniques and customer care,
• the opportunities offered by new technology (eg improvements in marketing, ticketing, information provision, presentation, retailing, education and open learning),
• developing the potential for educational visits,
• widening access,
• the implications of the final phase of the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA), coming into force in 2004.

Main recommendations

• Industry training organisations should develop advanced customer care training, building on the success of Welcome Host, and make this available across the sector.
• The ETC, RTBs, sectoral organisations, DCMS and the Department for Education and Employment (DfEE) should work together, as appropriate, to help attractions develop their educational potential, to provide specific advice on the implications of the DDA for attractions, to develop guidance and to signpost IT initiatives.

Improving attractions' management skills

Most attractions are small businesses, often lacking the resources to pay for full-time, experienced attraction managers or for their professional development. Many are highly dependent on the services of volunteers and seasonal staff, which have the same training needs as full-time staff as they are often at the forefront of hosting visitors.

Pressures on smaller attraction operators can leave them without the overview of the sector that can be vital in achieving continuous improvement to meet changes in demand and in the market environment.

An ETC audit of the difficulties faced by attraction managers is currently underway and has reported some interim findings.

Main recommendations

• There is a need to co-ordinate training and continuous professional development across the whole sector, possibly by bringing the training needs and professional development of all attractions under one national training organisation.
• To develop a one-stop shop as a source of information and to act as a gateway to providers.
• One RTB should lead a pilot project on management and continuous professional development to include a mentoring initiative and a leadership development programme.
• Improve the quality of trainers from advisory organisations, such as Training and Enterprise Councils (TECs) and Business Links.
• The audit report should be circulated to the DCMS, DfEE, RTBs and NTOs, which will be invited to take the report's recommendations forward.

Stronger performance through benchmarking

Benchmarking is an effective way of:

• identifying the processes that deliver best practice,
• enabling management to compare an attraction's performance against that of its competitors across a range of indicators,
• identifying opportunities for improvement.

Benchmarking exercises are being carried out by a number of organisations, such as the Association of Independent Museums (AIM), the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions (ALVA), the Cultural Heritage National Training Organisation (CHNTO) and the Southern Tourist Board (STB).

Main recommendation

• The proposed attractions advisory group will be asked to lead initiatives to raise awareness and increase co-ordination between benchmarking schemes.

Raising the quality of attractions

Visitors seek, recognise and appreciate good quality in the attractions they choose to visit. For this reason, in 1991 the English Tourist Board (ETB) issued its Visitors' Charter as the basis for nationally agreed standards.

Although attractions have made great strides in meeting visitors' higher expectations, standards still vary. The ETC is leading initiatives to develop a quality assessment service to help improve standards among attractions and provide reassurance to visitors. The East of England Tourist Board is developing this service, in co-operation with the Heart of England Tourist Board and South West Tourism, and with the support of ETC.

Main recommendation

• ETC will support the work on the Visitor Attractions Quality Assurance Service (VAQAS) being developed by the East of England Tourist Board, and liaise with the proposed attractions advisory group to ensure that sectoral organisations are aware of the initiative and that their views are taken on board.

Improved funding and investment

Private and public sector funding are needed for investment to improve quality, training, marketing, presentation and access of attractions. In considering funding issues there are a number of aspects to be aware of:

• The uncertain revenues, longer return on investment time and lower returns on capital than in other sectors can make fundraising difficult.
• The costs of maintenance, restoration and refurbishment at many heritage attractions often cannot be fully recouped from admissions income and trading.
• The pricing of commercial attractions is constrained by competition from free entry attractions.
• Publicly-owned attractions are not allowed to borrow.
• Private sector attractions are largely ineligible for Lottery funding.
• The private sector is losing some visitors and key staff to new attractions developed with the aid of Lottery and EU funding.
• There is concern among the private sector that some of the publicly-developed attractions will require further subsidy to keep them open.

Main recommendations

• Priority should be given to supporting bids for improvements to existing attractions rather than creating new attractions.
• Priority should be given to attractions that are appropriate to the local area and culture.
• More realistic assessments need to be made of the number of visitors, revenues and costs of potential grant-aided projects and their likely impact on existing attractions.

Taxation

The range of taxes and tax reliefs applying to attractions is as diverse as the sector. In general, attractions-related taxation and fiscal policy must be seen in the light of overall tax regimes and should concentrate on a small number of key issues that are likely to have the most widespread benefit.

The tax regime should encourage reinvestment, recognise particular needs and improve the financial benefits from charitable donations.

Main recommendation

• ETC will advocate incentives for investment so that any changes to the tax system encourage reinvestment.

More effective, efficient development and planning

The land use planning system can deter acceptable and beneficial reinvestment, upgrading and product enhancement. Many operators of smaller attractions have difficulty with, or are daunted by, the planning system and are discouraged by delays.

There are at least 13 national Planning Policy Guidance notes (PPGs) with some relevance to tourism. Any recommendations for attractions must be looked at within the context of an integrated set of measures that take account of all elements of tourism supply.

Main recommendations

• There is a need to encourage a clear understanding of the context for attraction developments among planners and others at the national, regional and local levels.
• The ETC will encourage government to revise Planning Policy Guidance Note 21 to include updating Section 5.4 on large-scale attractions.
• Backed by policy support from ETC, the RTBs should work with local authorities to examine the impact of tourism proposals and encourage better regional coordination.

Increased co-ordination and co-operation

The attractions sector is characterised by its diversity and range of sectoral associations. The organisations of attraction owners and operators include:

• Association of Independent Museums (AIM)
• Association of Leading Visitor Attractions (ALVA)
• Association of Pleasure Craft Operators (APCO)
• British Association of Leisure Parks, Piers & Attractions (BALPPA)
• English Heritage
• Federation of Zoological Gardens of GB & Ireland
• Heritage Railways Association
• Historic Houses Association
• Museums Association
• National Churches Tourism Group
• National Farm Attractions Network (NFAN)
• National Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens
• National Trust
• Pilgrims Association (cathedrals & churches)
• Re:source (The Council for Museums, Archives and Libraries)
• UK Vineyards Association.

There is no overall liaison mechanism linking all types and sizes of attraction. A new cross-sectoral attractions advisory group could play a central role in:

• reviewing and revising the Visitors' Charter/Code of Practice,
• guiding improvements in research analysis and dissemination,
• developing the most appropriate benchmarking processes,
• guiding the quality assurance service,
• guiding and promoting industry-wide IT and booking systems,
• encouraging co-ordination, co-operation and information sharing between attractions and sectoral organisations,
• helping to monitor and revise this strategy.

Main recommendation

• ETC will consult with sectoral organisations and RTBs with a view to setting up a new cross-sectoral attractions advisory group.

Next step

The cross-industry consultation has highlighted the key challenges faced by the visitor attraction sector in England. Action for Attractions has provided the next step – a set of detailed recommendations for tackling the main issues: visitor satisfaction and quality assurance, market information and measurement, performance benchmarking, management development, planning and development, funding and taxation, and co-operation and co-ordination across the sector.

Now is the time to agree how these recommendations will be taken forward. The first step towards this will be a Forum for Attractions which Janet Anderson, Minister for Tourism, Film and Broadcasting, is planning to hold in the New Year to consider solutions to the problems identified by the sector.