‘Turn Castle Cornet into a boutique hotel’ - PwC
ST PETER PORT HARBOUR and the island’s culture and heritage should be top priorities in developing Guernsey’s tourist industry, according to a report by consultant PwC.
The Tourism Product and Customer Experience Strategic Review was completed in November 2017 and while a summary was published last month, it was only in the last week that the full version of the report appeared – although still redacted by PwC ‘to protect commercial sensitivities of third parties’.
The report criticised the local tourism offering as ‘stale, shabby and out of date,’ and made several recommendations as to how it could be improved.
One of the things it put at the top of the list of priorities was to ‘activate the harbour area around Castle Cornet’, with the report saying that while the building could be converted into a mix of restaurants, tailored retail and perhaps even a boutique hotel, the harbour itself was substantially underexploited.
It needed to be made more of a destination for visitors, said PwC, suggesting a mix of hotels, high-end residential, restaurants, bespoke retail and galleries. The report accepted that this would not be cheap, but said a public-private partnership would be the answer.
Additionally, the island needed to focus clearly on sectors of the market which were the least price-sensitive and would be more likely to value the overall ‘experience’ the island offers.
The current core visitor to the island is 45 or over, with just over a third aged over 65, and roughly 60% are return visitors.
PwC recommends targeting the younger baby boomers (middle class people aged from 50-64): ‘The empty nester segment which we think is under-penetrated today’.
‘These consumers look for high-quality experiences and have high expectations for accommodation standards, restaurant and retail offering, and overall service levels.
‘They holiday out of season and are flexible with length of stays.’
While the island’s Victorian/Edwardian aura could be attractive to this segment, and the French market targeted directly through its ties to Victor Hugo, an ageing population could be attracted by wellness-based tourism.
This covers spa and recreation as well as location-based experiences, said PwC.
Although none of Guernsey’s activity offerings are a good stand-alone draw relative to better options in the UK, they could form part of a ‘health and wellness package’.
More could be made of walking holidays, but: ‘To attract the main wellness market will require more spa and indoor activity options which need to be provided by hotels and will depend upon their own business cases.’
