How do you sell Ireland to Americans when they are likely to be served by Chinese students or have their first pints poured by Poles? Denis Staunton reports on a new campaign to lure greenbacks to our shores
Throughout the US this week, millions of people have watched parades, worn shamrock, piled into pubs for green beer and celebrated a real or imagined connection with Ireland. For most Americans, St Patrick's Day is nothing more than a welcome excuse for a party, mercifully free of ideology or serious purpose.
For the men and women who run the Irish tourism industry, however, this week has been deadly serious: their best chance to showcase Ireland in the US before the summer holiday season begins.
Ireland's tourism chiefs are worried about the US, which has for decades been one of the biggest and most lucrative markets in an industry that generated €5.3 billion for the economy last year and employs 150,000 people.
In terms of numbers, the US is second to Britain as a source of visitors to Ireland, but US tourists traditionally stay longer, spend more and spread their custom throughout the island.
Last year, when numbers from Britain and continental Europe rose, the number of visitors from the US fell by almost 3 per cent, to 965,000. Some in the tourism industry fear that, if Ireland doesn't change the way it sells itself to Americans, the trend could become irreversible.
"I think we need a radical change in what we're doing," says Hilary Finlay, who runs Ireland's Blue Book, an organisation that promotes an upmarket collection of country-house hotels and castles.
"We have to get the message out directly to the consumer, because they're going to book direct and because travel agents are probably going to disappear eventually. We have to work towards finding out where the niche products are. We need to go to the lifestyle shows. We need the lifestyle magazines. You always market from the top."
Tourism Ireland, which promotes tourism overseas for the whole island, is so concerned about the fall in US numbers that it has launched a review of the North American market. Last month, Tourism Ireland brought more than 40 Irish companies to the US for a roadshow that visited most major cities, reaching 4,500 travel executives, and staged the biggest ever Irish presence at the New York Times Travel Show.
Joe Byrne, Tourism Ireland's head for North America, is leading the review, which he promises will be comprehensive and unflinching. "We're fundamentally looking at what has been happening in the recent past out of the North American market to all destinations. How have travel patterns changed? How have travel patterns to Ireland mirrored the overall changes? What would happen to Irish tourism if those trends were to continue?" he says.
Some Americans have been reluctant to holiday abroad since the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001, although Ireland has suffered a smaller drop in numbers than most European countries. The war in Iraq, the strength of the euro and health crises, such as Sars and foot-and-mouth disease, have all helped to depress US tourist numbers.
Ireland faces a particular challenge, however, as Irish emigrants to the US grow older and the number of people calling themselves Irish- Americans dwindles. Until recently, Irish tour operators had an enviably simple marketing task in the US, advertising in Irish-American newspapers and working through a network of small travel agents in Irish districts of Boston, New York and San Francisco.
Most US tourists were returning emigrants and Americans of Irish descent who were happy to fly to Shannon, get on a coach and go wherever their tour guide took them. The majority of the 130,000 Irish-born residents of the US emigrated in the 1950s and are now over 70; the last census showed a sharp fall in the number of Irish-Americans, from 40 million to 35 million. Last year, for the first time, most US visitors to Ireland claimed no Irish ancestry whatsoever.
It's not only the Irish-Americans who are disappearing; the travel agents are vanishing, too. "The corner-shop operations, the mom-and-pop travel agents that Ireland depended on, all the way from Queens to the Bronx, are not there any more, and the daughters and sons are not taking up that business. The commission, which they depended on, is going or gone," says Pat Dooley of Dooley Car Rentals, a company that has targeted US visitors to Ireland.
The internet has transformed the travel business, driving agents out of business as customers increasingly book flights, hotels and rental cars online. It has also created a huge marketing challenge for people such as Dooley, who now avoids print advertising and focuses on the web. "I buy keywords [ that will appear in the results of internet searches], so that I'm positioned in a place where they can view it," he says.
Louise Langan of Killarney Hotels employs marketing analysts to track visitors to her website and establish the most useful keywords and the most effective links. "You can't just sit back and hope that someone is going to hit your site," she says. "You have to actively create a marketing strategy for your website."
Under a revolving green-and-white canopy advertising the Ryder Cup at the K Club, in Co Kildare, in September, Ireland's stand was attracting a steady stream of visitors at the New York Times Travel Show. The technology of marketing Ireland may have changed, but the country's two basic attractions for Americans remain the same: the scenery and the people.
The Irish countryside is more or less intact, but prosperity and immigration have created a new problem for the tourism industry: how to provide an Irish welcome when most of your staff are new immigrants themselves. "It's a huge problem," says Langan. "There are not an awful lot of Irish people applying for the jobs. What we try to do, at a minimum, is ensure that the front-line people are Irish. On reservations, we need English speakers - native English speakers, not foreigners speaking good English."
Many hotels operate a similar policy, although Langan says that foreign workers bring a professionalism to many hospitality jobs that few of their Irish counterparts can match.
Jean Dunne, a New York estate agent who was at the travel show to plan her eighth holiday to Ireland, this summer, said she noticed the last time she stayed in Dublin that the staff at her hotel were not Irish. "It's not the same. The non-Irish are quiet. They don't talk to you in the morning. They don't wish you good morning. They're not service-oriented, and they're not always asking if you'd like more tea or anything like that. It certainly makes a big difference."
Gene Albarelle, another visitor to the show, said that, as a New Yorker, he is used to dealing with every nationality and no longer notices where anyone is from. But for his second trip to Ireland he is thinking of hiring a driver with a lot of local knowledge.
"We found the stories fantastic. It made you understand the countryside. We thought if someone took us, they could take us to places that were more real and less touristy. We could listen to stories forever."
Tourism Ireland's review of North America will not be complete until June, but Joe Byrne has already made some changes, launching a series of television and internet advertisements that stress the activities tourists can enjoy in Ireland. "The perception of Ireland is of a beautiful place with friendly people, but there's a lack of knowledge about what you'd actually be doing there during your holidays," he says.
Tourism Ireland hopes to capitalise on the week of free television publicity the Ryder Cup will provide, showcasing Ireland as a luxury destination, and not just for golf tourism. The organisation also hopes to attract more visitors with Ulster-Scots backgrounds, particularly from the southern US states and Canada.
Almost 95 per cent of US visitors to Ireland say it met or exceeded their expectations, and Ireland seems to be on every American's list of destinations to visit one day."That's where the challenge is. It's a 'some day' destination rather than: 'I want to go there now, or next year'. Our work will be about adding a sense of urgency to it," says Byrne.
He believes, however, that the most important decision for Irish tourism this year is the agreement between Dublin and Washington to open up more transatlantic air routes. "The three things that are going to dramatically turn around Irish tourism numbers from North America are access, access and access. It's as critical as that. I would be bitterly disappointed if we did not have at least two new gateways being served in the spring of next year and additional capacity on existing routes," he says.
Tourism Ireland's ambition for 2006 is not only to reverse the decline in US tourist numbers but also to attract more than a million in total. Dooley says the signs are promising, but he remains cautious - and a little anxious. "The indications are fantastic, but we've seen this before and got a kick in the butt as time has gone on. Right now I'm very optimistic."