Experiential Tourism - Riding Mountain National Park and Winnipeg, Manitoba
February 16th - February 21st
Celes Davar, the President of Earth Rhythms Inc. will be facilitating this mission and providing the group with the opportunity to experience his company, which is a leader in experiential learning, learning adventures and customized experiences in Western Canada. This mission will concentrate on "hands on" experiences and packaging. This mission will look at how to collaborate with local resorts, facilities, and service providers in a rural setting to offer an experience in nature which provides authenticity, inspiration, and replenishment of the spirit through the programs, guides, and facilitators used.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
- Learn how to effectively customize vacation experiences in every aspect by linking activities, meals, special events, etc. through successful partnerships.
- How to recognize opportunities that exist to partner within regional communities to find ways to create experiences that feature innovative, multiple partners.
- Learn new methods to make personal connections with each visitor, to create experiences that are inherently personal, engage their senses and makes connections on an emotional, physical, spiritual or intellectual level.
- To be aware of the investments required to implement effective experiential travel experiences/marketing
- To be educated on the benefits of investing in experiential marketing and travel.
- How to apply experiential travel to packaging for niche markets (recognizing costs and benefits)
- How to build relationships with guests/visitors that continue after the visit, rather than just selling them a single travel product.
- Great opportunity to investigate how to “up sell” a potential visitor and offer a true experience as opposed to a bed.
PARTICIPANT OUTCOMES:
Experiences
· Learned about experiential tourism and participated in a couple of relevant tourism experiences, and used this learning to apply to discussions about tourism product development for small groups and leisure travelers (FIT).
· Learned experientially throughout the workshop.
· Took part in relevant urban winter festival “behind the scenes” experiences at the largest winter festival in western Canada – Festival du Voyageur – and learned about customizing opportunities, and how they are working with partners to deliver multiple experiences in a short time period.
Packaging and product development of experiences
· Learned some basic concepts and skills associated with customized tourism packaging, experiential travel, and niche market focus within a rural Manitoba context.
· Understood tourism product development and packaging, as relevant to the Riding Mountain region, in particular by meeting with Earth Rhythms partners and having frank product development discussions with the partners.
· Take away a handbook (journal) that provides a “look back” and explanation of concepts, ideas, and reflections recorded during the workshop. Opportunities for filling out personal action plans will be provided.
Community partnering and collaboration
· Experienced quality in the manner in which all components of the workshop are presented or delivered. Will have been exposed to examples of why attention-to-detail and quality are critical ingredients without which their region will not be able to compete effectively.
· Experienced learning together, in a collaborative environment, and discussed the importance of this with local and regional partners.
Additional Elements
· Will have experienced a presentation from Celes Davar, as a trained presenter for The Climate Project-Canada about climate change and impacts on tourism product development and transportation. Will have discussed tactics and strategies for how to mitigate the carbon footprint associated with the delivery of tourism experiences.
Click Here for the Experiential Tourism Final Report
-Will be seriously reviewing carbon footprint on the environment and making the necessary changes
-We are going to re-examine our product offerings and look at ways to enhance them as a result of some of the experiential content we saw on the mission.
-I’m looking into partnering with some of the other participants to provide some experiential tourism packages. We would also like to market these experiences to the leisure traveler and also the corporate group.
-Currently, we are reviewing our online package builder configuration and may add a new category for experiential tourism. This will also be a promoted on our main packages and specials page.
