More People are Choosing Jersey as a Holiday Destination

Jersey welcomed almost 356,000 people for a holiday to our amazing Island during 2016.

This was the third year of growth and the best for 5 years and beat our 2016 target of 352,000 staying holiday visitors, a growth of 2.6%.

Total visitors (which includes day trips, visiting friends and relatives, and business travellers) were 692,000, 3.6% below 2015. This was just over 5% below the 733,000 target for total visitors. Staying business and non-leisure day visitors were down by 21,000 (17%) and leisure day trippers by 3,000 (3%).

Staying holiday visitors from the UK increased 7% and Germany 6%, whilst those from France declined 6% and from Guernsey declined 22%.  We are pleased that partners who participated in our 2016 marketing efforts are all joining forces with Visit Jersey again this year to ensure the UK and German holiday visitor numbers continue this upward trend. In France, we are working with Condor on a new campaign to increase both day trips and staying leisure visitors.

More first time holiday makers are coming. We are encouraged that a little over half, 53%, of those visiting for Holiday/Leisure said that this was their first visit to Jersey. Historically, slightly less than 50% of Holiday/Leisure visitors were first time visitors.

We asked visitors how they rate different aspects of their Jersey experience. During the second half of 2016 (the survey began from July 2016), departing visitors gave Jersey a Net Promoter Score of 67, indicating high levels of advocacy. This is an impressive score; destinations typically rate around the 50 mark.

Keith Beecham said “2016 was the first full year of Visit Jersey’s existence. It was a year of considerable change and some challenges. Key indicators for 2017 and the longer term remain good. January saw a 4.3% increase in air arrivals (includes visitors and returning residents). Forward hotel bookings for April (Easter period) are looking strong and May is ahead of this stage last year. In addition to favourable external factors, our new, partner-driven marketing continues to deliver opportunities for industry partners to work with Visit Jersey to support our objective of sustainable growth and productivity improvement for this vital sector of Jersey’s economy.”

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Notes to Editors:

From July 2016, we switched from a “visitor registration card survey” method of collecting visitor data to an “exit survey”. This report is comprised of these two sets of data. Future reports will be based on the exit survey, which will provide a fuller description of our visitors.

Visitor Profile

July to December 2016 Exit Survey

Visitors were asked how they rate different aspects of their experience. Jersey is rated as ‘Excellent’ for its ‘Safety and Security’ by 88% of respondents, with 81% rating Jersey ‘Excellent’ for ‘Cleanliness’, 79% for its ‘Beaches and Countryside’ and 71% for ‘Jersey in general’.

Cumulatively, during the second half of 2016, departing visitors gave Jersey a Net Promoter Score of 67; this is impressive. Destinations typically rate around the 50 mark.

Ratings (of those expressing an opinion)

Whether making a first visit to Jersey

Journey purpose mix of visits

For the full year staying holiday visitors from the UK increased 7% and Germany 6%, whilst those from France declined 6% and from Guernsey declined 22%.

Across all journey purposes, during the final six months of the year, the markets generating the largest volume of visits to Jersey were the UK, France, Germany and Guernsey.