Hamilton & Waikato Tourism Business Partnership Programme 2023-2024
Our role is to attract domestic and international visitors and increase length of stay and expenditure through effective destination marketing, development, and management activity. HWT promotes the Waikato as a preferred destination for domestic and international business, events and leisure travellers and provides leadership in regional product and event development, investment, and sector capability.
HWT encourages visitors to enjoy the variety of experiences throughout the Waikato region in turn contributing to the economic, social and cultural benefit of the wider community.
How do we do this?
Working under a private-public partnership model, Hamilton & Waikato Tourism receives council funding from our six city and district councils (Hamilton City Council, Waipa District Council, Waikato District Council, Waitomo District Council, Otorohanga District Council and Matamata Piako District Council). This support enables us to focus on destination management, sector capability and product development as well as promote the region to leisure and business events visitors, media and the travel trade.
Our promotional work includes our regional website www.waikatonz.com, media and trade pitches, familiarisations, sales meetings and trips, attendance at trade shows, working with key industry partners – including Tourism New Zealand and neighbouring regional tourism organisations – and running complimentary local industry events.
Each year Hamilton & Waikato Tourism works to achieve an agreed target for the value of tourism industry investment, in order to further leverage local government's investment and show our council partners the industry commitment to tourism in the region.
We do this through various further regional marketing campaigns and promotional initiatives including our partnership programme.
Current tourism situation
The Waikato has a catchment of 2.3 million people within a three-hour drive radius, while the city of Hamilton itself serves as a gateway for those arriving by air.
As New Zealand’s fourth largest region for visitor expenditure at $1.87 billion for the YE Oct23 (MRTE Oct 23) - third largest for domestic at $1.4 billion and fifth largest for international visitor expenditure at $395 million (MRTE Oct 23), there is a significant, vibrant and growing tourism sector here.
The Waikato is offers high quality experiences and is well-placed to deliver world-class sporting, consumer and business events, and also hosts a strong 'Visiting Friends and Relatives' (VFR) market.
1.2mil guest nights a year (ADP Apr23) are spent here and the region has a 10% market share for business events, behind Auckland and Wellington (Business Events data YE Sept 23).
Why partner with us?
Our partnership programme allows us to work collaboratively as a region, to achieve scale and impact in what remains a highly competitive marketplace – both internationally and domestically. Your business is featured throughout our initiatives allowing for exposure to domestic and international leisure and business events visitors as well as key travel trade, business events buyers and media through our various owned, paid and earned channels.
Partnership areas include:
- Domestic marketing
- International marketing
- Business Events marketing
How to partner with us
For further information about partnership benefits and investment levels, please download a copy of our 2023 - 2024 Partnership matrix below.
Download HWT Partnership Matrix 2023-2024
Partnership for the 2023-2024 year has now closed. If you would like to look at partnering with us for the 2024-2025 year, which begins from Jul 2024, please email info@waikatonz.com.