UK snaps up £2bn a year thanks to sporty visitors

Published on Tuesday 13 July 2010 17:24

THE biggest winner at premier sporting events such as The Open is the British economy, according to a new report that shows tourists who come to play or spectate spend £2 billion a year in the UK.

Research by Visit Britain has found that sports fans who arrive in the UK to watch events such as Wimbledon or to participate in sports such as golf contribute billions to the British economy by spending almost twice the average tourist.

The three million sporty tourists account for 14 per cent of all visitors to the UK, and spent 2.3bn in 2008 alone.

The study found that whilst some come for the thrill of watching Nadal storm Wimbledon, hundreds of thousands descend on golf courses across Scotland and England. They spend an average of 900 per trip, almost twice the 500 ordinary visitors spend, and are estimated to support 50,000 jobs right across the country.

Scotland is a principal beneficiary of sports tourism with the Open Golf Championship beginning at St Andrews in Scotland tomorrow, and both the Ryder Cup and the Commonwealth Games coming in 2014.

VisitBitain researchers believe the power of sport to draw overseas visitors is expanding fast and could create more jobs and economic growth.

The Open Championship is worth more than 72 million to Scotland, the equivalent of 1m for each championship hole played.

Yesterday a spokesperson for VisitScotland said: "Scotland has a wealth of fantastic sporting events for visitors to enjoy, among the best is the Open Championships at St Andrews starting this week, which will bring millions of pounds to Scotland. We feature a range of sporting events in our marketing as well as encouraging visitors to come to Scotland to get active themselves.

"As we look forward to welcoming the Ryder Cup and Commonwealth Games to Scotland, the importance of sport and sporting events to our tourism industry is set to continue."

Britain's football is the key attraction for foreign spectators with about 1.2 million attending a match. Of these 267,000 were Irish, 95,000 Americans, 88,000 Germans, 86,000 Norwegians, 75,000 Spanish, 65,000 Italians, 55,000 Australians, 52,000 Dutch, 46,000 French and 39,000 Swedes.

Joe Aitken, head of major events at Glasgow City Marketing Bureau, said: "We know from previous experience that hosting events of the stature of the Uefa Cup Final at Hampden in 2007 for example resulted in 16.3m of local economic benefit.

We are currently exploring the highly successful Australian events business model, which has been pursued to great effect by Sydney and Melbourne since their respective hosting of the Olympics and Commonwealth Games."

The survey shows nearly two million visitors watched sport in Britain in 2008. They often did this at an iconic venue such as Lord's or Hampden Park spending more than 1.3bn in the process. Meanwhile, 1.4 million visitors played some form of amateur sport at more modest British locations, contributing another 1.3b.

Last night Sandie Dawe, chief executive of Visit Britain, said: "This survey clearly demonstrates British sport is growing in popularity with foreign visitors.

"Millions are travelling to watch our world-class events and participate in our famous, sometimes quirky, sporting traditions.

"It is a hugely encouraging sign that Britain has the sporting expertise to stage an Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2012 that we hope will win the hearts of the world and deliver a tourism legacy, jobs and economic growth for this country."z