Wales Outdoors are the most 'liked' privately owned adventure company in Wales!
Are Facebook 'likes' an indicator of popularity? Despite what you might think of Facebook, and we certainly haven't 'liked' their business, it's a useful tool for finding out about what's going on and for developing networks, maintaining friendships and for reaching out. And we do think it's an indicator of popularity. 'Likes' are hard to come by, they are gained by consistent positive feedback and friends recommendations rather than by advertising or unreliable blowing of own trumpets.
Wales Outdoors recently got to 14,000 likes, a milestone of a sort, and the three zeros gave us pause to reflect and comment upon how we got here...
With our main competitors in South Wales falling far short of our popularity we wonder why the tourism industry in Wales has not been in touch, why we have not been offered awards and accolades or why we are not being approached to act as ambassadors for the promotion of Wales. After all, we are BY FAR the most popular adventure company in Wales when looking at numbers coming through, by feedback received and by traffic on social media.
For example, main competitors Black Mountain Activities have 2200 likes and Call of the Wild has 2750 and these are the largest adventure providers in South Wales. They come not even close to Wales Outdoors in terms of social media reach and so in support for the tourism industry in Wales. Past colleagues Hawk Adventures have just 70 likes, this despite being awarded best Activity Company of the Year 2017 by Brecon Beacons Tourism... One wonders what is going on there...
TYF, perhaps the best known of the privately owned adventure companies in Wales has 6000 fb likes. We know that the BBC, that VisitWales, that the local tourism associations and the 'visit' sites focus on these lesser 'liked' business' and provide a platform for them to sell their services. These business' also attract public funding for business development. Wales Outdoors has never taken public money for business development and has consistently asked for the current buzzword, 'level playing field', to be in place for all tourism business' in Wales. It's near impossible for this to be achieved however. Nepotism absolutely remains a thing...
So we congratulate ourselves on continuing to develop wonderful adventure opportunities in Wales and beyond for those who live in Wales and for those beyond the borders. Many of our clients come from England or further afield. Many stay over for a weekend when coming out adventuring with us. The spend is high and the local economy is enhanced. We do a great job. And we do that job without any government agency or local tourism support.
We therefore ask the question, 'why have we not been contacted by VisitWales?' They need to be talking to those who are getting it right. And consistently they haven't done this. Reaching out is something that government agencies are appalling at doing, be that in the arts with The Arts Council or in tourism with VisitWales. The loss of opportunity for all is huge and the few 'friends' continue to benefit to the detriment of the hard working quality business' that ought to be lauded.
So we are giving ourselves an award. It's Tourism For Wales Award and the category is 'Most LIKED Tourism Business In Wales' and we'll have that for 2016, for 2017, for 2018, for 2019 and again for 2020. Thank you :)
Well done us!