PORTLAND TOURIST ASSOCIATION STATEMENT OF PURPOSE

The Portland Tourist Association is a Not for Profit Organization

The Portland Tourist Association invites all businesses and individuals to join us and bevcome involved with the promotion of Portland and its surrounding areas to tourists and locals, to draw and retain business and tourism to our region.  

The Role of a local Tourist Association is to ........

•  Liaise with the local community on tourism issues.
• Develop local tourism products
• Co-ordinate local facilities and services.
• Visitor servicing. Providing a quality visitor experience throughout all tourism businesses.
• Work with regional Tourist Associations in the Discovery Coast (Casterton, Dartmoor, Heywood and Nelson) on co-operative marketing programs.
• Represent members to and co-ordinate with local government on tourism issues.

Raise the professionalism of our local tourism industry by offering opportunities for networking, training and industry familiarization.

Distribution of Tourism Dollars

• Each tourism dollar circulates throughout the towns economy eight times before it dissipates.
• We all benefit from tourism, if not directly then indirectly as each business not only sells to the public but also buys from other businesses with the same tourist dollars.
• Even those businesses that don't see tourists through their doors can benefit from tourist dollars in other ways.

 

Portland Tourist Association Benifits

• Supporting local community, being recognised and supported by the community.
• Networking, making connections within your industry and other partnerships relevant to your business.
• One voice on issues that affect our members and shopping precinct.
• Invitations to various business and social events.
• Lobbying to all levels of government on your behalf giving local business a voice.
• Being able to display your brochures at the Portland Visitor Information Centre
• Drawing tourism and business to our region and encourage everyone to shop locally.
• Best of all you will get to know your neighbours and the business community and help build a stronger Portland.

 

Take up the Challenge for Tourism Dollars

• There are only so many tourism dollars to go around. We need to draw tourism and business to our area and not let it escape to other areas because of the state of the economy or seasonal factors.
• Our biggest competition comes from neighbouring regions, Warrnambool, Port Fairy, Hamilton and Mt Gambier.
• We need to challenge these areas and cannot afford to have large leakage of retail dollars to our neighbours.

 

Promotional Opportunities for Members

• Portland Tourist Association Web Site-   www.visitportland.com.au and face book page
• The web site is owned and operated by the Portland Tourist Association. It features a powerful members directory, and information on the whole Discovery Coast.
• This web site is easy to use and I-Phone friendly to make it accessible to the large number of people who use their mobile devices to access the web while travelling.
• All members have the opportunity to display their brochures at the Portland Visitor Information Centre.
• Accommodation referal service is a service for members provided by the Visitor Information Centre on a daily basis.
• All Portland and surrounding accommodation providers who are members are listed in a comprehensive regional accommodation guide that is available at three of the district Visitor Information Centres.
• The Visitor Information Centre encourages members to inform them of vacancies/ accommodation availability especially during the bust times of school holidays and long weekends so they can assist in referring potential guests to your business.

Contacting the Portland Tourist Association

Email  [email protected]     This email is checked daily.