Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / James Doolan: Hotel Council Aotearoa Strategic Director on the rise in luxury tourism spending in New Zealand

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James Doolan: Hotel Council Aotearoa Strategic Director on the rise in luxury tourism spending in New Zealand · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

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  Speaker 1: New Zealand's increasingly becoming a luxury tourism hot spot. New
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  Speaker 1: Data estimates it generated more than eight million dollars in
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  Speaker 1: revenue last year. By twenty thirty three, that could be
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  Speaker 1: more than doubled eighteen billion dollars. And that's not a
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  Speaker 1: bad chunk of change. James Dolan is the strategic director
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  Speaker 1: of Hotel Council Alter and he joins me Now, good morning.
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  Speaker 2: James, morning, pranchaster. How are you good?
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  Speaker 1: Hey? Why is New Zealand becoming increasingly popular as a
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  Speaker 1: luxury tourism hot spot.
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  Speaker 2: Well, look, I think a number of reasons, but first
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  Speaker 2: and foremost, it's a great news story. And we have
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  Speaker 2: a wonderful international standard tourism product, amazing landscapes, wonderful people
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  Speaker 2: are warm, wealth but we're also benefiting from a lot
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  Speaker 2: of global taiale winds and tourism and travel generally as
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  Speaker 2: people get wealthier in parts of Asia and Africa and
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  Speaker 2: India are definitely getting wealthier. As people get wealthier, and
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  Speaker 2: once they get a certain basic level of security, they
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  Speaker 2: want to travel experience the rest of the world. That's
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  Speaker 2: a makely human It's a wonderful thing in New Zealand.
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  Speaker 2: Needs a very small share of the international outbound tourism market,
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  Speaker 2: so it's a great opportunity for us to grow our economy.
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  Speaker 1: James, what type of traveler are we talking about here?
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  Speaker 1: Are we talking about the very wealthy or is it
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  Speaker 1: the average traveler just wanting a high end experience and
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  Speaker 1: you know we've got you favorable exchange rates at the
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  Speaker 1: moment for some overseas tourists.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. Look, that's a great question because a lot of
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  Speaker 2: people get wrong. I mean, I don't know what the
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  Speaker 2: exact term is, but I like that kind of average wealthy,
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  Speaker 2: entry level wealthy. I mean New Zealand geographically, we're a
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  Speaker 2: long way away from the rest of the world. Just
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  Speaker 2: to pay for the air fares to get here. Any
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  Speaker 2: traveler who comes to New Zealand, and that includes the
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  Speaker 2: backpackers obviously, are by international standards, fairly wealthy. But we're
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  Speaker 2: talking of about folks who are pushing the boat out
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  Speaker 2: even more. And if you pay a lot to come
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  Speaker 2: here on the plane, especially by business travel, you are
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  Speaker 2: more likely to push the boat out. At dinner time,
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  Speaker 2: you're more likely to maybe stretch for a helicopter ride
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  Speaker 2: or a high end restaurant and that might be people
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  Speaker 2: as to say, who've really saved very hard, because New
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  Speaker 2: Zealand is for many of them are once and done
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  Speaker 2: or trip of lifetime destination. And that's a great audience
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  Speaker 2: for us to be getting here.
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  Speaker 1: So we've got the helicopters, we know, we have excellent restaurants,
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  Speaker 1: we know we've got fantastic scenery. It's world class. Our
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  Speaker 1: other facilities good enough for those seeking a luxury experience.
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  Speaker 2: Again, a really good question, because when you start attracting
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  Speaker 2: high end travelers, you are attracting discerning travelers. And the
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  Speaker 2: New Zealand's a wonderful scenery kind of gets up the
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  Speaker 2: interest level. Quality of our attractions, our built form, and
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  Speaker 2: our service that's what closes the deals and deal and
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  Speaker 2: sticks with people. And I was just going to say,
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  Speaker 2: it's not an easy thing for us to deliver luxury
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  Speaker 2: service or luxury hotels in New Zealand. It's not easy
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  Speaker 2: because we have relatively high labor costs. We've all got
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  Speaker 2: many people have experienced lots of service while traveling overseas.
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  Speaker 2: We've got fairly high labor costs, and we've got fairly
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  Speaker 2: high construction costs, and our hotels are Grace and do well,
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  Speaker 2: but it's expensive to build them and it's expensive to
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  Speaker 2: run them.
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  Speaker 1: James really appreciate your time this morning. Thank you so much.
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• 3:48
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