Council unanimously supports Thrive Riverina and Riverina Cooperative Marketing Campaign

18 Apr 2018 7:13 PM -

Leeton Shire Council endorsed a two year membership to Thrive Riverina and two year commitment to participate in a Riverina Cooperative Marketing Campaign at its April Ordinary Council meeting.

Council’s Acting Manager Communications and Marketing Brent Lawrence, who is also a Board Director of Thrive Riverina, stated in his report to Council that the structure and operations of regional tourism has changed over the past 12 months.

“Thrive Riverina was formed to maintain a common purpose amongst local government areas with regard to the tourism and events sectors in our part of the larger Riverina Murray area. Importantly, Thrive Riverina works in collaboration with Destination Riverina Murray (DRM) to develop tourism in our region, and seeks to complement its work without duplication.”

The new strategic direction for Thrive Riverina includes four main pillars:

1. Membership- re-positioned to offer member councils more benefits for a fairer fee, with the option to participate in marketing campaigns relevant to the individual needs of each council.

2. Digital Marketing- Riverina digital marketing platforms will be reinvigorated with a story-telling approach with the former Riverina Regional Tourism website, Inside the Riverina website and Taste Riverina website to be rationalised and re-invigorated to create one inspirational travel website that encourages visitors to the Riverina.

3. Taste Riverina- will transition from a month-long festival in October to become a year-long marketing umbrella for food and wine related events across the region. In addition, the Taste Riverina brand will be used as a vehicle to take the Riverina to the city with out-of-region events planned for key audiences in Canberra and Sydney.

4. Cooperative Marketing- in conjunction with DRM and Destination NSW (DNSW), Thrive Riverina will implement a unified and scalable destination marketing campaign informed by the new Riverina-Murray Destination Management Plan that was launched in mid-March this year.

Mr Lawrence further added that the Riverina Cooperative Marketing Campaign for the Riverina region (valued at $250,000 based on a minimum of 10 member
Councils participating) will leverage dollar-for-dollar funding from DNSW and ensure significant media buying power is achieved through access to the expertise of DNSW’s marketing team.

“This campaign, to be implemented in two phases during the 2018/19 and 2019/20 financial years, will create consistent regional branding for the Riverina that all local government participants including Leeton Shire Council can use to their advantage.”

Leeton Shire Council Mayor Paul Maytom said that Leeton Shire Council has long been a proud supporter of regional tourism.

“Council is very pleased to be able to support Thrive Riverina and the Riverina Cooperative Marketing Campaign. Participation in Thrive Riverina and the cooperative campaign go hand in hand and will be a great opportunity to increase visitation to Leeton and the Riverina region as well as to create consistent messaging around the Riverina brand.”