Tourism chair: 'Tobago Beyond' branding needs buy-in

Executive chairman of the Tobago Tourism Agency Ltd (TTAL) Alicia Edwards is fixed on making the “Tobago Beyond” brand part of the local conversation.

Edwards told the Tobago Updates morning show on Tuesday that the Tobago Beyond brand was launched but not sold to the people of Tobago in the way it was supposed to be. She said as a result, part of the action being focused on for the coming year is to make the brand a part of the local conversation.

“It’s not enough to change signage and put things up – people must understand why, people must understand how, people must buy in to the brand stories. And so there are a number of activities behind the scenes that we’re engaging in..to actually work on making that Tobago brand more relevant and relatable to the Tobago population.”

She said over the last few weeks the board has been meeting to set strategic imperatives for the next year and one of the crucial things it has agreed is necessary is that the strategic planning for 2024-2026 must start.

“We want to come up with a shared vision for the destination along with our stakeholders. We want to come up with a shared work plan to buy in some support from our stakeholders and general members of the public.”

She said it is important for cohesiveness, as the work of the agency is really just support, and there is a lot of work on the ground to be done.

“Not just actual physical work, but emotional work, social work, connection work, relationship work."Starting the new planning period with the people who will benefiting and co-operating with the agency would be a good way to make some of the changes, she said.

She said on the marketing front, activity continues in various markets, singling out the Condor flights.

Condor Airlines will relaunched its service between Germany and Tobago from November. Flights are available for booking from now, and the service will operate throughout the winter 2023-2024 season. She said this was the result of long negotiations.

“Destinations now have to make a business case at every level. And so we’re heartened by the endorsement from Condor, the fact that Tobago is still a strong enough long-haul market for them to fly."And so, beyond the winter, we have already started about continuing the service as far as we can afford, as a year round service maybe in conjunction with another island.”

On events and festivals, she said after the recent four-day Tobago Jazz Experience, the agency is finalising the surveys.

“Our jazz survey started with the actual surveys during the jazz events, but it continued with some exit surveys that are just being wrapped up.”