COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

MEETING OF SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

Monday, May 09, 2011

QUESTION NO. 8

QUESTION: Councillor C. Jones

To ask the Manager if South Dublin Tourist Board has considered having any meetings off-site in areas of particular tourist interest such as The Liffey Valley area and Dublin Mountains?

REPLY:

South Dublin County Tourism rotates its board meetings at various venues across South Dublin County.  Monthly hotels meetings are hosted by all 13 member hotels as are the monthly golf club meetings with 7 member golf clubs. General members meetings have visited Corkagh Park, National Basketball Arena, Áras Chrónáin and Tallaght Stadium. SDCT promotes the Dublin Mountains with the support of South Dublin County Council through a regional marketing campaign each year via Hallowfest.

The board of SDCT are taking a hike this summer in the Dublin Mountains to fully appreciate the tourism potential. 

With the launch of a dedicated iphone app - iGuide South Dublin, SDCT will have increased capacity to profile and promote more cultural, historical and scenic aspects of South Dublin in greater depth. We will be working with several of the council departments to input data and information on the events page of the iguide and significantly expand the pages relevant to the representation of South Dublin County. 

Historically the company has had a low profile in Lucan and Clondalkin. However the company has had several members join recently from both areas which will enable us to work more actively in the area. At present we are working on two activity events for Waterstown Park in Palmerston that will take place in June and September 2011.    

A walking festival is scheduled for September in the Dublin Mountains and we are at the preliminary stages of event planning a rafting/canoeing event for the River Liffey based around Lucan. 

Recent meetings with the newly formed and affiliated Adamstown Cricket Club have opened a new area of sports tourism that warrants further development.  In this area we are working with the sports officers in South Dublin County Council. 

National TV coverage focussed on the World Irish Dancing Championships 2011 profiled teachers based at Áras Chrónáin, Clondalkin and excellent coverage of Citywest Hotel and the surrounding area. This footage together with footage compiled by SDCT, once edited, will become a key marketing tool for the company.    

At present SDCT manages 3 facebook pages, one for South Dublin County and new pages just active for Clondalkin and Lucan.

All Council associated properties such as leisure centres, golf course, horse riding centre and parks across the county are actively promoted.

As we expand the membership of the company, board members and general members do visit and are informed of the unique aspects of each member/venue/amenity. Indeed cross promotion of members products amongst members is possibly unique to SDCT. 

On joining SDCT all members are asked to take information/flyers/promotional material that will enable visitors to experience the variety of venues, events and activities available in South Dublin County. 

The companies website under the new name of http://www.dublingolfhotels.ie/  has monthly visits of 60,000 (average) and page views in excess of 200,000.