Vienna Tourism Conference 2023: PULSATING VIENNA

"PULSATING VIENNA" was the motto of the Vienna Tourism Conference 2023, which took place on 13 November in the Aula der Wissenschaften. In front of around 450 participants, Tourism Director Norbert Kettner informed the Viennese visitor economy about the current key figures of the Viennese tourism industry, the activities of the Vienna Tourist Board and the upcoming annual theme 2024, which is dedicated to eleven vibrant Viennese neighbourhoods. In her keynote speech, international guest speaker Carmel Allen , Managing Director of the Tate Galleries , showed how art and culture can develop a city and what influence they have on the neighbourhood in particular.

Watch the entire Vienna Tourism Conference 2022 via stream

2023: Vienna's city tourism has overcome the pandemic

After being welcomed by ORF presenter Eser Akbaba , Tourism Director Norbert Kettner began his presentation with a look back at tourism in Vienna in 2023: Despite difficult geopolitical conditions, Vienna's guests are once again as international as in 2019 with over 80% of overnight stays abroad, the USA has consolidated its position as Vienna's strongest long-distance market (3rd place in the overnight stay statistics behind Austria and Germany), congresses and corporate conferences are back in full swing. In the first half of the year, Vienna's accommodation providers generated more than half a billion euros, with net overnight revenues growing faster than overnight stays. With 12.5 million overnight stays up to September, Vienna's city tourism has de facto reached pre-corona levels in the year to date: overnight stays in the first quarter corresponded to around 97% of the volume from the same period in 2019. Important benchmarks for the conference industry - above all the ranking of the International Congress and Convention Association - once again place Vienna in the top group of conference metropolises worldwide.

Kettner also addressed the current framework conditions, which pose a range of challenges for Vienna's visitor economy, from geopolitical upheavals to inflation, and presented Vienna's tourism performance in the international context of European benchmark cities. He also discussed the significance of the city's most important activities that have a direct impact on tourism in Vienna - from the Vienna Conference Fund, the support programme for the Viennese congress industry, to the planned amendment to the Vienna Building Code, which provides for stricter regulations for platform rentals.

In his opening statement, Peter Hanke , City Councillor for Finance, Economy, Labour, International Affairs and Wiener Stadtwerke and President of the Vienna Tourist Board, thanked everyone who is committed to Vienna's tourism industry. Together with them, the city invests in Vienna tourism; the city's activities range from culture to the conference industry, which has returned to full bloom in Vienna. As a city of encounters, Vienna's strength also lies in a geopolitically challenging time in which a contribution must be made to peace and international understanding. In view of the renewed rise in tourism figures in 2023, Vienna is not only focussing on sustainable tourism growth in tourism marketing, but also at the level of city administration and urban development, which is also supported by the Viennese population.

Markus Grie?ler , Chairman of the Tourism and Leisure Industry Division of the Vienna Chamber of Commerce and Vice President of the Vienna Tourist Board, emphasised that Vienna's economy has proven itself in the face of the pandemic, climate change and geopolitics and thanked the players in the industry for this. He emphasised individual initiatives at company level that underline Vienna's pioneering role in climate protection. When asked to what extent artificial intelligence represents a challenge for the Viennese tourism industry, Grie?ler recognised new opportunities and new perspectives for employees, who can gain more capacity for their core tasks, such as customer contact, through the targeted use of AI.

Helmut Gruber, Vice President of the Vienna Chamber of Labour, emphasised that the topic of artificial intelligence should not be ignored and at the same time invited the social partners to work together with the Chamber of Labour to develop new offers that take current technological developments into account. Competent skilled workers would always be needed and the human factor would not be replaced, but would be subject to change. When asked how the attractiveness of tourism professions could be maintained, Gruber called for flexibility, but above all stability in employment relationships. If companies invest in their employees, for example in the form of further training measures, and offer them stable working conditions with prospects even in difficult times, the shortage of skilled labour can also be successfully countered.

Theme year 2024 "Heartbeat Streets. Fall in Love with Neighbourhoods"

After an overview of current and future tourist highlights and the planned international marketing activities of the Vienna Tourist Board, Tourism Director Kettner presented the motto under which the Vienna Tourist Board is organising its activities in 2024: Heartbeat Streets. Fall in Love with Vienna's Neighbourhoods. With this, the Vienna Tourist Board is showcasing eleven Viennese districts outside the tourist centre internationally - and involving the people who shape these districts. The aim is for the entire city to benefit from the added value created by tourism.

"We see great potential for sustainable tourism development in the interplay between Vienna's districts. We want to focus even more on the Viennese districts outside the Ring and the Gürtel than before, as half of all visitors to Vienna come to the city for the second time. A third are even regular visitors. Guests want to experience something new, genuine and authentic - this trend extends from Germany to South Korea. Nine out of ten Viennese have a positive attitude towards tourism. We want to keep it that way, which is why we want to position Vienna's attractions more broadly from a position of strength and at the same time relieve the heavily frequented areas," explains Kettner.

Cultural tourism as an enrichment for guests and residents

In her keynote speech, this year's guest speaker and Managing Director of the Tate Galleries, Carmel Allen, showed how art and culture can influence a city and contribute to increasing its attractiveness. She emphasised the importance of neighbourhood involvement, open access to art and the balance between residents and visitors. Following the lecture, tourism director Kettner and guest speaker Allen discussed on the podium how guests and residents benefit from tourism and how cultural institutions can be successfully integrated into neighbourhoods - because it is precisely in neighbourhoods that culture and urban culture are created.

Social, green and inclusive conference

After the official part of the tourism conference, the cosy finale began: in addition to the opportunity to network, guests were able to discover the culinary flair of various Viennese districts, such as the Buchteln of the Vienna Social Business Vollpension in the Freihausviertel - one of eleven Viennese districts that will be the focus of the Vienna Tourist Board's marketing activities in 2024. In 2023, the tourism conference was also certified as a "Green Meeting" according to the criteria of the Austrian Ecolabel and - in addition to climate-friendly planning - all CO2 emissions that were generated during the event and could not be avoided were calculated and offset by the climate protection projects in cooperation with Climate Partner. In addition, the Vienna Tourism Conference was translated into sign language for the first time.