In the hope of attracting more British and Irish tourists, the Spanish island, Lanzarote, has agreed on a deal with budget airline, Ryanair, to try and boost tourism – backtracking on previous comments made by the island’s president to reduce the number of Brits visiting.
A new advertising campaign costing €275,000 aims to attract travellers to the Canary Islands, not just from the UK and Ireland, but also from other European countries such as Italy, Croatia, Belgium, Germany, France and Poland.
The island’s leadership recently came under fire because of comments made about the quality of British Tourists visiting Lanzarote. President Dolores Corujo said she wanted to see the island rely less on “the British market”, and focus on tourists from mainland Europe, MailOnline reports.
Ms Corujo said: “It’s essential to work on the diversification of the sector and the growth of markets like the German market, which adapt to our intentions of aiming at higher-quality tourism and holidaymakers who spend more when they’re here and moves us away from mass tourism.”
British tourists make up nearly half of the tourists who visit Lanzarote and British expats make up five percent of Lanzaorte’s 130,000 population.
The previous comments made by the leader have come under heavy fire with local politicians wading in on the debate.
Lanzarote’s opposition leader Astrid Perez said: “I don’t expect the British to boycott Lanzarote just because of the irresponsible comments of a politician whose words don’t represent islanders’ feelings.”
President Corujo was later forced to backtrack and said: “I will say it once and for all. British tourism has always, is and will always be welcome on the island of Lanzarote.”
Lanzarote, one of the Canary Islands off the coast of West Africa, is known for its year-round warm weather, beaches and volcanic landscape.
As soon as you step foot on the island, you notice the unique colours of its volcanic landscapes, contrasting with the blue of the Atlantic – and it is a popular destination for Brits wanting to travel to Spain.
The island, however, wasn’t the first in Spain to start targeting quality over quantity. Recently, Mallorca revealed that it would not allow more than three cruise ships a day to the island’s capital of Palma across 2023 and 2024.
The Director of Tourism for Mallorca, Lucia Escribano said that the island was “not interested in having budget tourists from the UK”.
Similarly, at the end of 2022, Amsterdam revealed that it was cracking down on rowdy tourists, as reported in TimeOut. Their “stay away” campaign targeted Brits who are widely considered to be the city’s rowdiest tourists.
