Australian visitors may well be our target market, but getting the Aussies to spend their money crossing the Tasman may take some work.
Tourism New Zealand regional manager Barry Edington, based in Australia, addressed members of Destination Queenstown at their quarterly update at the Millennium Hotel on Thursday night.
Mr Edington said a banking crisis had moved to an economic one and Australian consumers had lost confidence and "gone into this precious saving mode".
While Australians were still providing the biggest business for New Zealand tourism - up 3% to about 986,000 visitors, or about 40% of the market - New Zealand would be facing competition in getting the Australian dollar spent on its shores.
"At the moment it's the best time ever to upgrade your household appliances . . . everyone knows these items will never, ever be cheaper in Australia than they are now . . . we're competing with that."
More competition was coming from car dealers in a country "awash with unsold cars".
Fifty pages of The Sydney Morning Herald each weekend were dedicated to cars for sale, with Toyota alone having 40,000 2008-model cars it had to move.
There was also competition from domestic Australian markets, including Tasmania, Victoria, West Australia and Queensland, with the slogan "where the diving dollar won't sink you".
Nevertheless, Mr Edington said Tourism New Zealand was confident it would see Australian visitor numbers hit 1 million in the first six months of 2009.
Working in its favour was 320,000 additional transtasman seats and cheaper flights as a result of a drop in the fuel surcharges, booking times now becoming as short as a fortnight prior to travel, and a weak Australian dollar making holidays in Australia and New Zealand look more attractive.
However, Australians needed "immediacy triggers" - finding ways to motivate them to "come now".
Mr Edington said there was a perception New Zealand was beautiful but it would always be there "and we can probably get around it in a wheelchair".
"Many believe it's not an easy travel destination. There are two islands, several ways to traverse them, several entry and exit points - it's not a straightforward fly into one place and go home.
"There's a little bit of work involved."
New Zealand was also not seen as a place where a visitor could "indulge in comfort and be pampered" and it was also viewed as an expensive place to visit, he said.
"The message at the moment is make sure you price right and you're giving really good value for money. Consumers' ideas have changed given that things are slightly tighter.
"The message is to remember there's a lot of doom and gloom around at the moment . . .
"Probably in the New Year, when everyone's had time to reflect on life, they'll realise things aren't that bad. They've still got a job, they've still got money and they need a holiday.
"At that time, we'll [advertise]."
Mr Edington said a new Tourism New Zealand campaign would go live on Boxing Day.
Destination Queenstown acting chief executive Graham Budd said it was important to be realistic, but remain optimistic about the current market conditions and the marketing campaigns.
"I think we need to be optimistic. I'm optimistic the activity we're doing is as good as we can possibly do."
