Development of the mission statement
The tourism mission statement of the City of Bonn sharpens Bonn's tourism profile by setting out goals and fields of action that the city administration and tourism stakeholders want to work towards together. It was developed between September and December 2022 as part of a participatory process. Representatives of the city administration as well as numerous stakeholders from politics and tourism were involved. Through expert discussions, workshops and a virtual participation platform, the participants were able to contribute their expert assessments and comment on the current state of development of the mission statement on several occasions. As far as possible and appropriate, these were then taken into account for the present mission statement.
The mission statement is based on an introductory brief analysis that took into account both statistical data and existing studies on Bonn. One component was also the calculation of the economic effects of tourism for Bonn in 2019 in order to be able to quantify the importance of this economic sector for the first time. Finally, nine core statements summarize the most important findings of the analysis for different subject areas.
As part of the participatory process, the participants developed a tourism vision for Bonn based on each other and jointly defined the goals to be achieved by 2030 for the further development of tourism, the fields of action to be worked on for this purpose as well as the future focus topics and target groups.
Vision 2030 for the City of Bonn
The "Tourism Vision Bonn 2030" describes the state to be aspired to in 2030 from the point of view of those involved. It is a picture of the future that all relevant stakeholders in Bonn want to work towards achieving. In terms of content, it addresses the targeted quality-oriented growth course, the external impact Bonn wants to achieve and the focus to be transferred to day-to-day business in product and service development and marketing. It also covers the type of cooperation envisaged and important focal points such as sustainability, inclusion, tourism awareness and quality of stay.
Goals and fields of action for tourism development up to 2030
In order to make the tourism vision for Bonn 2030 described above a reality, the city administration and tourism stakeholders want to pursue the following main goals for the further development of tourism in Bonn:
- Overarching goal 1: Realization of quality-oriented tourism growth
- Objective 2: Development of product development that generates travel and theme-oriented target group marketing
- Objective 3: Improvement of structures and cooperation in Bonn and with the Rhein-Sieg district
- Objective 4: Promoting sustainable tourism and strengthening tourism awareness
- Goal 5: Ensuring a quality of stay and thematic experience for guests that is tailored to their needs and target groups
In line with the objectives, the mission statement defines and describes four central fields of action in which extensive measures must be implemented to achieve the objectives.
Future focus topics and target groups
Bonn has a wide range of tourist attractions and themes, but these are in very different stages of development and are therefore only partially suitable for tourism marketing. It is important to focus on the most promising themes and target groups. The much-vaunted diversity of offers is not a unique selling point. In order to focus product development and marketing more strongly and bundle offers, priority and development topics have therefore been defined for both the leisure segment (day tourism as well as national and international overnight tourism (privately motivated)) and the MICE segment (stands for meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions). MICE is usually defined as primarily business events):
Key topics in the leisure segment (working names)
- Bonn - City of Beethoven and culture with the following focal points (with content adjustments in international marketing): cultural and authentic Bonn, Beethoven's Bonn, political Bonn and German post-war history
- Bonn - Gateway to the Romantic Rhine: nature and activities along the Rhine, fairytale Siebengebirge and Drachenfels
Development themes in the leisure segment
- UN City of Bonn
- Lower German Limes World Heritage Site
Key topics in the MICE segment (working title)
- Congress and UN City of Bonn
Focus on the value-oriented target group of "post-materialists" (Sinus-Milieu)
The formulation of key themes for tourism marketing alone is no longer sufficient today. Rather, theme-oriented target group marketing is necessary, which takes into account the value orientation of potential guests. For this reason, tourism marketing for Bonn will focus primarily on the post-material milieu in the future, as Bonn is particularly well suited to this milieu and this target group also fulfills an important hinge function for other milieu milieu and this target group also fulfills an important hinge function for other milieus, so that the focus is not too limiting. This focus also follows the recommendation of the state tourism strategy for North Rhine-Westphalia.
Perspective Tourism Bonn
With this mission statement, the city administration of the City of Bonn has laid an important foundation for the targeted further development of tourism in Bonn. The implementation of the mission statement now requires not only the city administration and Bonn Information, but also the T&C and other tourism stakeholders and service providers in Bonn and the Rhein-Sieg district. This is the only way to give Bonn tourism the necessary direction and further strengthen tourism as an important economic factor.