Dundalk Chamber host Major Tourism Conference

April 6, 2017

On the 5th April Dundalk Chamber of Commerce hosted a major Tourism Conference in the Four Seasons Hotel Carlingford. Over 200 delegates from all over Ireland attended the event. The conference was sponsored by Matthews Coach Hire, Local Enterprise Office Louth, The Four Seasons Hotel Carlingford, BIDS, British Irish Chamber of Commerce and Louth County Council.
The event brought expert speakers together from various tourism projects from around Ireland. The speakers are leaders in their field of tourism provision, and they gave an overview of their own tourism success stories, and suggested to the delegates that they too could emulate their success, and create a format to revitalise their own tourism offering. The event gave practical tips to delegates on how to improve their tourism business so that they could increase their sales and boost attendance figures at their attraction!

There was five key speakers at the event included John Teeling of the Great Northern Distillery who discussed the potential of whiskey tourism and what visitors are looking for. John McGrane (British Irish Chamber of Commerce) mentioned how his Chamber can help create cross border links. Daragh Anglim (Failte Ireland) informed delegates of how by using Ireland’s “Ancient East” brand can help grow your business. Allan Hamilton of Brilliant Trails spoke about what is working in Community Tourism. Brian Tyrrell of Kilkenny County Council covered what lessons can be learned from the Medieval mile in Kilkenny and Google’s Lucy Molan discussed capturing the moments that matter for today’s traveller! To finish off the event Raymond Coyle of Tayto Park told his story to the delegates.

Michael Gaynor President of the Dundalk Chamber of Commerce in his opening address told delegates that tourism has a critical role in contributing to Louth’s economic development. “Louth has a strong value proposition, and our challenge as a county is to further expand the reach of its existing tourism product”

There were over 35 stands exhibiting a range of tourism based ‘product lines’ on the day. The conference also featured a Tourism Advisory Clinic with exhibits from, Local Enterprise Office Louth, Southern Regional College, Louth Leader Partnership, and Louth County Council Planning Office.