A Jehovah’s Witnesses convention is projected to inject over $20 million into Auckland’s economy.
The said event, which runs for three days, is forecast to deliver more than 60,000 visitor nights while driving hotel occupancy to 85%.
“You hear people talking about tourism in New Zealand and trying to get back to pre-Covid levels, but really we need to be about 130% of pre-Covid levels, because 2019 is seven years ago now,” Hotel Council Aotearoa strategic director James Doolan said during a conversation with the Morning Report.
“We need more international and domestic visitors. We’ve also got a very, very expensive railway link in Auckland, and fewer people actually go into the CBD to work, so we have to turn our CBD, our central business district, into a central entertainment district, and events are a big part of that.”
“Events attract people to Auckland, and it creates what’s called compression,” he said. “Because we have about 14,000 hotel rooms in Auckland, we’re a big city, so 14,000 hotel rooms that need to be sold out 365 days of the year.”
“The only way you do that is if you also have events; you can’t just have [Free Independent Travel].”
Doolan noted that major events like the Jehovah’s Witnesses Convention require years of planning.
“You also need to pay what’s called subvention payments for some of these events, and that’s essentially a cash incentive to encourage an event to come to New Zealand or Auckland instead of many of the competitor destinations around the world.”