The Croatian National Tourist Board organised for the first time ever the presentation of Croatia and the Croatian tourist offer in Australia. The presentation and the workshop for 70 Australian travel agents and seven major Australian tour operators in Melbourne was organised in cooperation with the Slovenian Tourist Board under the name “Experience Croatia, Feel Slovenia”.
"Given that presentations and workshops are being organised for the first time on this particularly important and large market for us, we are extremely pleased with this great response of Australian agents and partners, especially those who intend to offer Croatia to Australian travel enthusiast for the first time. The response of our tourist operators is excellent as well, as they recognise Croatian potential on the Australian market, with approximately 243,000 arrivals last year, and more than 745,000 overnight stays, which represents a 15 percent increase in arrivals and 12 percent increase in overnight stays compared to 2017. Australians mostly visit Zagreb, Dubrovnik and Split, where almost 70 percent of the total arrivals of Australian tourists in Croatia is realised. However, in Melbourne we also presented Istria, Kvarner, Slavonia, that is all the parts of our beautiful country”, stated the Director of the Croatian National Tourist Board, Kristjan Staničić, and added that the tourism traffic from the Australian market is steadily growing and that in this year’s first part of the tourist season, compared to the same period last year, we registered an increase of arrivals and overnight stays from this market of more than 7 percent.
Eleven Croatian tourist operators participated at the presentation and workshop, namely the Dubrovnik and Neretva County Tourist Board, Rijeka - European Capital of Culture 2020, Croatia Airlines, Zagreb Tourist Board, Dubrovnik Tourist Board, Katarina Line Cruises &Tours, Atlas Plus, Navigare Yachting, Bagatin Clinic, Aronda Adriana Travel and Olivari, while Slovenia’s tourist offer was represented by four Slovenian partners, namely KNM Travel, Ljubljana Tourism & Ljubljana Castle, Palma Travel DMC and Happy Tours.
“Since 2015 we have been recording a steady increase in the number of Australian guests, and we presented Zagreb as a year-round destination with special emphasis on cultural and health tourism”, stated the Director of the Zagreb Tourist Board, Martina Bienenfeld, while the Director of the Dubrovnik Tourist Board, Romana Vlašić, pointed out that the Australian market occupies sixth place when it comes to tourism traffic in Dubrovnik, and that it is among the fastest growing distant market, whose guests are coming throughout the tourist year.
The presentation was attended by some of the largest Australian tour operators, like Adriatica, a company which is part of the Impulse Travel Group with over 30 years of experience, and which includes Croatia in its offer; Beyond Travel, the leading Australian and New Zealand company specialized in Central and Eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Turkey, Greece, Croatia and Slovenia, as well as in cruise travel, and Outdoor Travel, a company specialised in active holidays in Europe, which cooperates with over 1,200 agents throughout Australia.
Moreover, a number of factors affect the increase of Australian travel, from a strong Australian Dollar to competitive airline fares, globalisation and increase in the simplicity of international travel. Australian tourists are very active and famous for their adventurous spirit, they like to practice sports and activities in nature, their travels to Europe and the United States usually last from 11 to 16 days for business travel, while they spend even more time for holidays. They spend on average between 3,500 and 4,000 AUD on their travel, and in terms of Australian regions, most of the travels abroad are realised from New South Wales, followed by Victoria, Queensland and Western Australia.
