What do Non-Visitors really think about the South West?

New research released today focuses on the Non-Visitor attitudes towards the South West, and explores what they really think about the region.

The research was conducted to develop a better understanding of this market and pinpoint factors that may be causing lapsed visitors, including factors that need improving to pull these people towards the South West in the future.

The Non Visitor report looked at current, recent and lapsed visitors to the South West and was conducted through an online questionnaire and follow up interviews, with over 2,000 people, outside of the region.

The overall perceptions and feelings towards the South West are very positive and  ‘traditional' is absolutely confirmed as being a strong association in a positive light, along with peaceful, relaxing and ‘charming' also being a top association.

Since the last Non-visitor Study in 1994, three barriers that were identified then have since been removed according to the 2009 survey.

• The South West is no longer associated with polluted seas and dirty beaches - in fact clean and unspoilt both feature as top 10 image associations.
  
• The region is no longer associated with tackiness and commercialisation. 
  
• The region is very much associated with a welcoming feeling towards visitors

Barriers to recent and lapsed visitors to the region were: distance/difficult journey, lack of guaranteed sunshine and no friends/relatives to visit.  Other barriers featured no deals available and a lack of distinctiveness.

Malcolm Bell, Director of South West Tourism said:

"The results show that the non visitors research is just as important as investigating what the current visitor perceptions are of the region, so we can learn what appeals and what doesn't appeal to non visitors and potentially address these issues.

It is positive to see that the South West has strong associations with clean beaches, and a feeling of welcome. However, there are also barriers that we can't overcome which might be contributing to lapsed visitors, like guaranteed sunshine.

Equally there are things that can be done to attract visitors back to the region. These include offering more deals to visitors, not discounting but offering added value, focusing on fresh quality produce and the highlighting the region's distinctiveness. It is therefore important the industry and the region as a whole work towards addressing these barriers whilst improving the positive associations even more, so that we can attract any lapsed visitors back and increase spend for the region."

To download the full report, click here.
To download the Executive Summary, click here.

Date added: Thursday 9th July 2009
Latest updated: Thursday 2nd May 2013