Media spotlight to the value of 2.5million placed on Wexford during 2015 

2015 was a very successful year for tourism in Ireland and in Wexford. Nationally in 2015 there has been a 12% growth in overseas visitors numbers and it continues to rise; through Visit Wexford a media spotlight to the tune of €2.5million was placed on Wexford and it’s tourism industry.

The publicity campaign carried out for Visit Wexford of which the ambition is to achieve as many column inches and news and programme minutes as possible for Wexford across Ireland and the globe on tourism events and attractions and happenings in Wexford during 2015 achieved €2.5 million in media coverage across Ireland and the globe

Some of the media highlights include coverage include TG4, TV3, RTE News and RTE Radio 1, Today FM and 2FM along with press outlets in Ireland and in the UK in The Irish Post and The Irish World, and in the U.S. in Irish American News and Irish America.

A huge milestone was achieved in 2013, some 2 years after the formation of Visit Wexford, a milestone which saw Wexford achieve the highest number of overseas visitors and overseas visitor spend in the region for the first time in over 10 years. This achievement is still being maintained by Wexford.

In marketing terms during 2015 Visit Wexford unveiled a brand new Visit Wexford television advertisement promoting Wexford as a holiday destination on national TV for the first time. This aired on RTE and TV3 for 6 weeks in the lead into the Summer holiday period. The thirty-second TV advert was the first of its kind to air promoting Wexford as a number one choice for a holiday in Ireland; the advert was voiced by a very famous Wexford Ambassador and TV personality Dermot O’Leary.

An extensive Marketing campaign took place in 2015 with activities devised to promote the county nationally and internationally; Wexford County Council and the tourism industry in Wexford jointly funded the campaign. It included a number of national radio competitions along with a multi-site billboard campaign at high traffic areas in Dublin and Cork Cites, a new Visit Wexford welcome billboard at Rosslare Port.  Wexford also featured extensively on the TV national events guide and a brand new brochure promoting Wexford was hosted at over 500 locations across Dublin, the Southeast and at Dublin Airport, Waterford Airport and the Ferry Ports.

The VisitWexford.ie website had over the course of 2015 traffic of over 140,000 with those visitors browsing the site for over 3 minutes on each occasion.  60% of the website users are from Ireland with the remainder coming from overseas.

Commenting on the year in Tourism, Bettie Marie Burget-Smit Chairperson of Visit Wexford said, “It’s been a very busy year in the tourism industry in Wexford. The visit Wexford website in 2015 alone reached an audience of 140,000; over 50 festivals took place in Wexford in 2015 and all of these are showcased on the site which is updated weekly. The Visit Wexford table is made up up of a collaboration of persons working in the tourism industry and also partners from Wexford County Council, Failte Ireland, Wexford Leader Partnership, Rosslare Port and each of the major towns tourism group repersentatives.

We have a very exciting campaign to promote Wexford across a variety of media outlets for 2016 and beyond and we look forward to working with all of the industry in the New Year”

The Visit Wexford website offers the opportunity to promote festivals and events for free online. Organisers of festivals and events can now log on and fill in all of their information for a free listing for 2016. See www.visitwexford.ie or get in touch via hello@visitwexford.ie