Uncommon solutions for uncommon times

(Originally published in TOURISM)

“We have seen a change in the mix of what our visitors look like coming in our front door,” says Dave Calder, vice-president of marketing and communications at the Vancouver Aquarium Dave. “There is no question that we have seen a softening of American tourists, particularly from Washington and Oregon States.” It would appear, he notes, that “the further away you get from Vancouver, the better numbers seem to have held up. It makes sense, because if someone from the US (not unlike someone from Canada) has made a decision to go on a trip, they probably planned it for some time and the dollar fluctuation may not be as relevant to them.”

“The aquarium, just by virtue of the kind of signature tourist attraction it is in this city, really draws well, year after year, from Washington, Oregon, Alberta, the interior of BC and Vancouver Island," says Calder. "Our sense of what has happened over the last few months is that while the American numbers have softened, the numbers from the Pacific Rim countries and Europe have pretty much (on a per-person basis) replaced that shortfall.”

And sometimes, the things that make a difference just happen spontaneously. “The #1 viewed ‘pet and animal video’ on YouTube is called ‘Otters Holding Hands’,” explains Calder, “a mere few thousand views away from the 8 million mark. It was posted this spring by a university professor from Florida who was in Vancouver a few years ago doing some post-graduate studies at the aquarium when she shot the video.

Calder’s team is making the most of this unexpected break to draw visitors. "We put this video (graciously offered to the aquarium by its author) onto the Air Canada in-flight package, so the people traveling out to Vancouver would see it. It was a simple solution, harnessed through creativity.” The exposure on the internet is phenomenal. Type ‘Otters Holding Hands’ into Google, and there are over 660,000 references to it. Sometimes, uncommonly good things happen when you really need them!

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