Green Tourism: A PR Trend or Something More?
Lately, I’ve noticed a number of city or state specific green tourism sites popping up. For instance, Wisconsin has a green tourism site.
Boston has a green site.
San Franscico has an excellent site.
Minnesota (through the University of Minnesota) has launched a site.
Virginia was one of the first states I saw with a green tourism site.
Even a city in Vietnam has put forth a green tourism initiative.
photo credit: Yodel Anecdotal
I’m curious about what others think about these sites and promotions. Is it just tourism hype? Or a good conscious effort to make a city green? Or somewhere in between?
Personally, I think the green tourism trend seems to be a good thing. The tourism sites I’ve seen are (for the most part) really well put together with useful information. Even with the economy as it is, green tourism is growing. And it’s nice to see that cities are still pushing green travel.
What do you think?
I think that, with most things, green tourism is a product that is trying to be sold. So in that way, it’s a bit of a PR job. However, it shows that there is DEMAND for green tourism, and like with most products, the cities will hopefully try to be more genuinely creative about how to appeal to these eco-friendly consumers.
I think that as with anything, there is good and bad to be found in all of the green tourism attention. While some allow self-rating, which can be misleading, others do an audit on property and this gives the clearest look at exactly what their green initiatives are. When I travel, I tend to visit http://www.EnvironmentallyFriendlyHotels.com, simply because they list the green features that a place has. From composting to recycling and more, they list green initiatives, so that I can determine if a lodging meets my own green standards or not.
i think these sites are a response to demand. I’ve also seen similar green sites for Houston, Florida and Hawaii. Much of the demand, however, is lead by the conference industry. As meeting and conference organizers aim to to be seen as green, destination marketers are simply showing what’s on offer in their city. The main problem though, is that the standards of what is considered green varies from destination to destination. I.e. a hotel considered green in Houston may not make the green grade in Wisconsin.
I think there is a real effort on the part of some places to go green for a wide variety of reasons but I think since green is hot, you get a greenwashing effect in which some cities do enough to attract people but thats it.
You see this in the tourism industry too. Money is the only green people care about