Tourism Ireland was announced as the overall winner of the World Routes 2015 Marketing Awards which were formally announced last night during the spectacular KZN Networking Evening which took place at People’s Park, next to the iconic Moses Mabhida Stadium.
Speaking just after receiving the highly regarded accolade, Siobhán McManamy, Head of Co-operative Marketing, Tourism Ireland, said “Tourism Ireland is delighted to be overall winner at the World Routes 2015 Marketing Awards. It recognises the great partnerships we have with our airports on the island of Ireland to support their route development efforts with airlines. Tourism Irelandhas 22 offices across the world and over 3 million Facebook followers, so our channels to market are second none. We are able to provide our airports with superior market intelligence which allows them to provide the relevant insight to their airline partners to improve air connectivity to Ireland.”
She continued “This was a big surprise. After winning in Abu Dhabi in 2012 and then being recognised as Highly Commended in Las Vegas in 2013, we simply did not believe we would be picking up this prestigious award tonight.”
“We’re delighted to mark the achievements of all of our nominated airports and destinations in our annual World Routes Marketing Awards. Year on year we are impressed by the calibre of the submissions,” said Katie Bland, Director, Routes, UBM EMEA continuing: “Tourism Ireland has exhibited excellence in airline marketing through a combination of commercial partnerships with airlines, funding co-operative campaigns with airline partners and inputting into government policy that support enhanced air connectivity.”
The awards, which are voted exclusively by airlines, were split into five categories this year comprising of four airport categories, split by size and a destination category for the best destination marketing campaign by a tourism authority.
Tourism Ireland was also named as the winner in the Destination category whilst Dubai Airports was honoured from the Over 50m Passengers category. From the 20-50m Passengers category, Copenhagen Airports took the top spot with Prague Airport winning the 4-20m Passengers category and Halifax Stanfield International Airport honoured in the Under 4m Passengers category.
Created in 1997 to recognise excellence in airport marketing as rewarded by airlines, the annual Routes awards provide the airline community with the chance to have their say as to which airport they think provides the best overall marketing services to them.
In addition to the shortlisted finalists nominated by the airlines, the overall winners from each of the regional Routes events from 2015 automatically gained a place in the final judging. This includes Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, Tourism Australia, Brussels Airport, and Dubai Airports, which were respectively announced as overall winners of the Routes Americas, Routes Asia, Routes Europe, and Routes Middle East & Africa heats. A respected panel of judges made up of senior members of the airline network planning community then reviewed the submissions from the nominated airports in order to determine the winners.The panel consisted of the following experts:
Christophe Viatte, CCO, Air Baltic
Olga Guizado, Senior Planning Analyst, COPA Airlines
Andrew Hodges, Head of Network and Scheduling, easyJet
John Checketts, Director Route Planning, JetBlue
Marco van Vliet, Head of Network and Alliances, Kenya Airways
Eric Nabong, Manager Business Planning, Philippine Airlines
The full list of companies shortlisted under each award category were as follows:
Over 50m Passengers
Amsterdam Airport Schiphol
Dubai Airports – Winner
Frankfurt Airport
Singapore Changi Airport – Highly Commended
Between 20-50m Passengers
Abu Dhabi Airports – Highly Commended
Brussels Airport
Copenhagen Airports A/S – Winner
Dublin Airport
Munich Airport
Vienna Airport
Between 4-20m Passengers
Athens International Airport
Austin-Bergstrom International Airport
Budapest Airport – Highly Commended
Cologne Bonn Airport
Prague Airport – Winner
Under 4m Passengers
Cork Airport – Highly Commended
Halifax Stanfield International Airport – Winner
Lodz Airport
Shannon Airport – Highly Commended
Verona Airport
Destination
Hungarian National Tourist Office
Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority – Highly Commended
Philippine Department of Tourism
Tourism Australia
Tourism Ireland – Winner
Turismo de Tenerife
Overall Winner
Tourism Ireland
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