A new industry body has been created to ensure visitors to Dundee and Angus have the best possible experience and drive repeat visitor numbers.
Dundee and Angus Visitor Accommodation Association has been established to improve standards in the hospitality industry in preparation for the expected influx of visitors to the city once the V&A Dundee design museum opens its doors in 2018.
The local hospitality trade has not had a collective voice since the demise of the Dundee Hotels Association several years ago.
However, the new group is wider in its scope and will also represent the interests of bed and breakfasts, guesthouses and the growing serviced apartments sector.
The new group will be formally launched during a session at Carnoustie Golf Hotel on April 28.
Richard Ellison, who runs the Doubletree by Hilton Dundee, has been nominated as the group’s chairman.
He said the waterfront development in Dundee presented a major opportunity but the sector had to get the nuts and bolts right first.
He said accommodation providers also had to take on board that the profile of the average visitor to the area was set to change, with the V&A likely to draw thousands more leisure tourists.
“We are one of the cities in Scotland where occupancy levels seem to be on the rise and average room rate is on the rise, although activity has slightly stalled as Dundee was a beneficiary of the Aberdeen oil industry and Aberdeen has declined,” Mr Ellison said.
“What the association is about is ensuring we are all geared up for the exciting new opportunities that are going to happen and the different type of customer that will come to the area.
“We expect a far greater leisure footfall and we have to gear up to provide a different service than we do to the corporate client staying one night.”
Mr Ellison said driving up standards across the board was key to success and said DAVAA would take a view on everything from taxi driver training to the quality of the food and drink on offer within the waterfront.
He said Dundee Airport’s soon-to-be-established direct scheduled route into Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport, an international hub of similar standing to Heathrow, represented an opportunity for the region too good to be missed.
“We need to get things right,” Mr Ellison continued.
“Our hotels, the way we meet and greet, our airport service, it has to be world class and that will give us a bit of pride.
“We are soon going to be getting international guests. They are going to come, look at and experience Dundee and we have one chance to get it right and make the right first impression.”
The association’s inaugural event will hear from Willie Cameron who has led a number of innovative collaborations between accommodation providers and other tourism businesses in and around Loch Ness that have transformed that area’s profile and its prospects.
Gordon Mackintosh, general manager of the Carnoustie Golf Hotel & Spa, and vice-chairman of DAVAA, said: “We are really excited to be launching DAVAA.
“We want it to be a forum where serious business and fun come together and that is exactly what our guests will experience when they join us at the launch event.”
Any accommodation provider interested in joining the group should contact membership secretary Alan Mitchell via alan@davaa.co.uk.