YARRA VALLEY A TOP EXPERIENCE

BY RENEE WOOD

THE Yarra Valley has topped the charts as a high class tourism destination being ranked as number five in the top one hundred most loved destinations around the world by the Tourism Sentiment Index.

The Tourism Sentiment Index delivers reports into data about destinations, analysing tourism assets and social network and review site comments to deliver a score for each destination.

In the 2023 list, Yarra Valley was ranked fifth with a score of 36.18 with winery and vineyards notably the top asset. The score and further the top 100 list is created by a study of data made up of 1.6 billion online conversations and content pieces about 21,330 global destinations.

The Yarra Valley rounded out the top five as the Maldives was listed at number one and Whitsundays Queensland, Sunshine Coast Queensland and Seychelles followed respectively.

Yarra Ranges Tourism was delighted to hear of the ranking with Marketing Manager Euan McDonald-Madden saying it’s a fantastic reflection of what’s on offer.

“It is really a great reflection of the customer service and the experience that we try to give out here that it’s translating into a great score, which is fantastic,” Mr McDonald-Madden said. The landscape of the rolling hills and national parks are valuable to the tourism opportunities, while great producers and operators assist in boosting what’s on offer.

“What is really important is how people feel when they come to their venue or their location or their restaurant and how they feel and how they walk away is the most important thing.”

Tarrawarra General Manager Samantha Isherwood said there are many great offerings locally and a lot of producers are making a statement albeit quite ‘humbly’.

“There are a lot of producers, whether that be wine or hospitality venues, that are producing some fantastic products and doing it quite humbly,” Ms Isherwood said.

“So really believing in what they’re doing and just offering something a little bit different to the people that visit and telling their story but from the heart.”

Ms Isherwood said that getting people engaged with the production of food and wine creates great interest for visitors.

“We take a lot of our customers out into the vineyard and show where the vines are at but we’ve also got a vineyard right in front of them basically.

“I think it’s really important to see the agricultural and the farming side of wine production.”

In order to keep these great standards, consistency and growth plans are needed for the future.

Yarra Ranges Tourism and council are looking into how to map out future growth and work has begun on a ’Destination Management Plan’.

The project is to create a 10 year strategy to support all aspects of managing the visitor economy and a community survey is now open.

“As we see Melbourne grow to possibly eight or 10 million in the next 10 to 20 years, we need to make sure that we have the offerings here that can cater for that growth, and then the growth of hopefully international and interstate tourism will be the key to making sure that our location stays in the top five or 10.”

Engagement began in January and is open until Saturday 28 February.

For more information, visit https://shaping.yarraranges.vic.gov. au/yarra-ranges-tourism-destination-management-plan