2010 is kicking off right in terms of Jerusalem tourism. The national government has taken a strong stance, investing 400 million NIS a year into the tourism industry and encouraging investment and growth. On the local level, the Jerusalem municipality increased its tourism budget by 266% for 2010.
This is good news following the first decade of the 2000s, which in terms of tourism, had something of a "best of times, worst of times" vibe.
First there was the Y2K scare and plans for millennium pilgrims – many of whom never materialized – followed by an intifada, not exactly the sort of event that attracts visitors. And yet, hotels were built and old ones upgraded, and by the end of the decade, tourist numbers were on the upswing once again, with nearly 3 million tourists visiting Israel per year in 2008 and 2009 – higher stats than even 2000 yielded.
David Tucker, Executive Assistant Manager of Sales and Marketing at the David Citadel tells GoJerusalem.com, "Until 2000 Jerusalem had a lot of tourists, but beginning in October 2000, those numbers started going down and kept going down until 2004 when it slowly started rebounding. It slowed down again in 2009 because of the economy, but already by the second half of the year, people were starting to come back."
The hotels of course, are trying to do their part to make sure the numbers continue increasing. Tucker spends almost three months a year in the United States and Europe promoting tourism. "In Mamilla, (another hotel with which Tucker is involved) we created a well-being center and have developed a very fashionable hotel, not the standard Jerusalem or even Israeli hotel. These changes are part of the trend that's attracting people these days. But what's really going to change the situation is if the government allocates a larger budget to tourism. Then tourism will grow."
Ilan Brenner, Executive Assistant Manager of Marketing and Sales at the Inbal Hotel explains to GoJerusalem.com, "I can speak about what happened in my five-star hotel, which mostly deals with tourists from the United States. 2009 was a problem. We felt the effect of the recession in the United States…it affected a lot of Federations, a lot of people who would normally be coming to Israel, though the numbers were already rebounding by the third and fourth quarters. It did lead to a change in the tourism culture though. People are now booking much later than they used to. It used to be rare to book only 30 days in advance. Now that is becoming the norm. Internet booking has also become more popular. This isn't unique to Israel, it's happening all over the world, it just came to Israel later."
As Brenner sees it, if the government wants tourism to pick up what they need is "Publicity, publicity, publicity and more publicity. Prior to the intifada, Israel was the fourth most popular conference destination. We need to rebuild this by investing and promoting the city. It's also important to publicize on the internet as that is how most people are looking for hotels and booking these days. Good publicity is so important. A guest who enjoys his stay tells 10 friends about his trip, but one who had a bad time will tell 20."
