Booming tourist numbers reveal an appetite for Orange

Tourism is booming in Orange!  And that’s with the region’s biggest drawcard event, F.O.O.D. Week, just around the corner!

Australia’s longest running regional food festival F.O.O.D. Week will celebrate its 30th anniversary when events kick off on April 9.

The volunteer-run event has been showcasing the produce of our region for three decade and in no small way has been responsible for growing Orange’s reputation as a ‘must-visit’ food and wine destination.

It is a reputation that draws growing numbers of visitors to the region each year and in the post-COVID lockdown months saw record numbers flock to the Colour City and surrounds.

In fact, new data has revealed that the September 2020 quarter was the busiest quarter on record for domestic overnight visitors to the Orange, Blayney and Cabonne region. An estimated 177,00 visitors stayed approximately 475,000 nights during the three-month period, making it the 4th highest of any quarter on record, and a truly astonishing 111 per cent higher than the same time in 2019.

And this is when Regional Australia, on average, was seeing a more than 20 per cent decline in visitor numbers.

Orange City Councillor Jeff Whitton said those of us who live in Orange, Blayney and Cabonne know how beautiful our region is, now the rest of Australia is finding out too.

“This is fabulous news for Orange, Cabonne and Blayney, to have numbers coming through say [tourist number] have increased by a hundred percent… it can only mean revenue for the community, jobs for the community,” he said.

Caddie Marshall, General Manager of destination marketing organisation Orange360, praised the hard work of local tourism operators being ready to meet the challenges presented by the pandemic and the associated public health measures.

“It has been such a difficult time for the tourism industry in NSW, Australia and across the world. However, as the September 2020 figures show there is actually huge appetite and confidence in regional travel and we are grateful to be on the receiving end of that here in the Orange region” said Caddie.

“It is a credit to our local tourism industry who emerged from lockdown committed to delivering exceptional products and memorable tourism experiences in the face of this ‘new normal’, and to our visitors who adhered to COVID-Safe guidelines to ensure that the amazing uptake in visitation did not result in any new COVID-19 cases for the Orange region.”

The data and anecdotal evidence shows there was an increase in visitor over 55 years of age, people who may normally have travelled overseas, but with the borders shut headed to the Central West.

But there was also an increase in younger people and families visiting the region and they were staying longer.

“Once those travel restrictions were opened, we had extra staff in, we were working extra hours, we had record numbers of phone calls and emails from people — particularly the 55 plus age group and first time visitors,” said Orange City Council’s Tourism Manager Glen Mickle.

There were so many visitors through the visitor centre, they had to get the revolving door serviced, he joked.

But from that post-COVID spike in visitor numbers following the relaxation of travel restrictions, interest in visiting the Orange region has remained high.

“Our numbers are sitting 20 to 30 per cent up,” said Caddie, who said that is compared to 2019, not the bushfire affected early months of 2020, which saw a slump in visitors.

The outbreak of the pandemic and government ordered lockdown force F.O.O.D. Week organisers to cancel their 2020 program and this year they have cautiously opted for a modified program of events.

“There will be slightly fewer number of events, but the events we've got this year are a fantastic showcase of our producers,” said Caddie.

“Some events have already sold out, which is fantastic! We are hearing from our accommodation providers that Easter is pretty much booked and now we are also hearing that we are taking forward bookings into June, which has never happened before.”

It’s accommodation availability that’s the main limiting factor on the growth of local tourism, says Caddie, who is confident in the industry’s growth.

“Absolutely! We can continue to market the region and show it off as best we can, but we won't get that return on investment until we can have an increased capacity and that's when we really hit our straps,” said Caddie

“But what we can see, in terms of the amount of investment, is that in 18 months’ time we will have an increased capacity in of about 25 percent of where we currently are at. In 2019, we did a bed audit where there were 2500 commercial beds available in Blayney Orange and Cabonne. So being able to increase that by an extra 25 percent lifts our capacity quite dramatically.”