Visitation to this area for the games could create a significant economic impact, while improving destination image, found GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.
Ralph Hollister, Travel and Tourism Analyst at GlobalData, comments:
“Major domestic destinations such as York and Whitby account for many of the visits to Yorkshire and The Humber.
With tourism being driven to a select few areas, many towns have been neglected, with Rotherham falling into this bracket.
However, Rotherham is hosting four games in the Women’s Euros, giving the area a prime opportunity to boost its profile, while helping Yorkshire and The Humber to become a leading region for domestic tourism.”
GlobalData’s latest report ‘UEFA Womens European Championships Business, Case Studies, Tourism Impact, Sponsorship and Media Landscape, 2022’ reveals that when cross referencing current ticket sales and historic domestic expenditure data collected by Welcome to Yorkshire, the 18,032 predicted day visitors from local and domestic areas for the games could create additional expenditure of $888,977 for Rotherham.
Yorkshire and The Humber received a solid number of visits in 2021, with 6.9 million. However, it is severely lagging when compared to domestic visits to the South West region, which had 17.6 million.
In 2022, GlobalData predicts that domestic visits to Yorkshire and The Humber will reach 10.6 million.
Out of the projected 3.7 million increase in visitation from 2021 to 2022, domestic visitation (domestic overnight and tourism day visits) created by the Women’s Euros games could be responsible for up to 3% of visits.
When combining the estimated attendance/visitation created across all eight games that are taking place in Yorkshire and The Humber, 135,818 will be traveling from either local areas, domestic locations, or internationally.
Using the hypothetical benchmark of 75% of tickets being sold for the entire tournament, 25.9% of tickets would be allocated to games in Yorkshire and The Humber based on the current estimated total visitors/attendees for games at Bramall Lane and the New York Stadium.
When using the 60% benchmark of attendees for all games in Yorkshire and The Humber being leisure day visitors from local areas and beyond, additional tourists of this type could add $4 million in tourism expenditure for the region.
When using the benchmark of 18% of ticket holders being international tourists, as per the UEFA impact report, this type of overseas tourism could create $13.2 million in additional tourism expenditure, when cross referencing attendance figures with historic expenditure data collected by Welcome to Yorkshire.
Hollister concludes:
“While the entire region of Yorkshire and The Humber is expected to benefit from hosting a number of games, Rotherham stands to experience the most significant gains, with the Women’s Euros even acting as a possible catalyst for a sustained increase in tourism to the area over the coming years.”