A convoy of nine helicopters swept across northern Southland on Friday afternoon, setting down in Riverton with 45 Australian visitors who had come for lunch.
The aircraft, operated by Queenstown company Totally Tourism under its The Helicopter Line brand, flew from Queenstown over Lumsden and Garston before landing at Riverton/Aparima, where the group ate at the Beach House. The sight of so many helicopters travelling together prompted a flurry of emails and messages from residents along the route wanting to know what was going on.
Totally Tourism sales manager Brad Patterson said the trip was part of the company's work with Great South, the regional development and tourism agency, to promote the wider Southland region.
The Helicopter Line had been working with Great South's key partners to showcase the region, he said, and the group's lunch in Riverton put money directly into the local economy and community. The feedback from the visitors had been "fantastic", and the company was looking forward to bringing more groups south.
Putting the coast in front of high-value visitors
Riverton, about 40 kilometres west of Invercargill at the mouth of the Aparima River, is a small fishing and holiday town that sits off the main international visitor routes through the south. Queenstown-based helicopter excursions are a small but lucrative slice of the market, and a group of 45 flown in for lunch is the kind of high-spending visit that regional promoters have been chasing.
Great South, which runs Southland's tourism promotion from Invercargill alongside its economic and business development work, has been pushing to spread visitor spending beyond Fiordland and into the region's towns. Its most recent quarterly tourism update, reported in September, put annual visitor spending in the region at $644.5 million, up 6.1 per cent, with international visitor spending in the June quarter up 24.4 per cent on a year earlier. Visitor numbers to Riverton itself were down 4.5 per cent in that quarter, which is one reason a Friday lunch for 45 Australians will have been noticed in the town.
Southland also featured in Tourism New Zealand's Invitation to Dinner campaign in July, and in September Great South highlighted its Southern Way partnership, which promotes Murihiku Southland's food offering to new audiences. A lunch of local food at the end of a scenic flight fits neatly with both.
For Lumsden and Garston residents who looked up on Friday, the explanation turned out to be simpler than many of the theories offered online: a day trip, a good lunch and a tourism operator testing how far south its Queenstown customers are willing to fly.
Mr Patterson said the company would look to do more of the trips. If the first one is any guide, Riverton's cafes and the small businesses along Palmerston Street will not object.
