19 August 2010 - Hawke’s Bay To Get Regional Event Strategy
Venture Hawke’s Bay is developing a regional event strategy in partnership with Sport Hawke’s Bay and Hawke’s Bay Wine Country Tourism Association.
The purpose of the project is to review Hawke’s Bay’s activity in relation to the events sector and to develop an event strategy that delivers future economic growth to the region.
Venture Hawke’s Bay Regional Promotion and Marketing Manager, Michael Wan says “Supporting a coordinated stream of events is hugely important to the regional economy, attracting new visitors to the region and making the most of the tourism opportunities and the infrastructure we already have in place.”
Scheduled for completion at the end of September 2010, the strategy will include recommendations for its effective implementation, using a governance and operational structure with the best fit for Hawke’s Bay.
Peter Burley of Sport Guidance Ltd and Anne Hindson of Via Training Ltd have been contracted to assist with the development of the strategy.
Michael Wan says “Peter and Anne bring considerable experience to the table having developed similar strategies for other regions. It’s important to get a credible outcome that works for all of us.”
An extensive consultation process with regional stakeholders begins on 25 August 2010. This stakeholder group includes territorial local authorities, the accommodation sector, iwi groups, the sports sector and regional event managers. The views captured will be considered with external research to form the future direction for events in the region.
A regional workshop will take place in mid-September to test the direction with a wider group of stakeholders.
“The outcome will be a robust strategy that we hope will have regional buy-in and appeal, particularly for those making planning or investment decisions around events,” says Michael Wan.
Sport Hawke’s Bay Commercial Manager, Kevin Murphy says “It is exciting for the region to be creating an event strategy – something we have needed for a long time. It will be important to get an end result that unites the region for the benefit of growing the event sector in Hawke’s Bay.”
18 August 2010 - Regional Partner Success for Hawke’s Bay Business
Joint Media Release from Venture Hawke's Bay and Hawke's Bay Chamber of Commerce
A joint venture proposal from Venture Hawke’s Bay and Hawke’s Bay Chamber of Commerce has been successful in being selected as the preferred provider for NZ Trade and Enterprise (NZTE) funding in the region.
The joint partnership will strengthen business support in the region by coordinating NZTE services that the Chamber provides with the TechNZ services from Venture Hawke’s Bay. Negotiations are still to be completed and a contract signed with NZTE.
Last year Venture Hawke’s Bay was successful in attracting $3.5m of TechNZ research and development funding across 45 businesses in the region. This is matched by local contribution in a 50/50 funding arrangements.
“Hawke’s Bay is seen as having one of the better deliveries of TechNZ funding and the joint venture proposal strengthens our ability to deliver these services in the region,“ said Michael Bassett-Foss, Venture Hawke’s Bay.
“The TechNZ funding reduces some of the risk for local businesses contemplating R&D work, which enables them to develop ideas to their full commercial potential.”
Murray Douglas, CEO of the Hawke’s Bay Chamber of Commerce said that the joint venture approach has great value for small businesses in Hawke’s Bay. It reflects the government’s greater commitment to business growth as contributing to economic development.
“For the last 8 years the Chamber has had some government funding to advise all businesses on start up options and ongoing support. This new programme will allow us to offer capability support through a list of private sector providers to all SME’s and offers exciting prospects for local business growth”.
“I am delighted with the success of this private sector /public sector partnership. It’s good for local business and the regional economy, and the increase in NZTE funding will benefit even more businesses over the next year,” said Mr Douglas.
18 August 2010 - A Different Kind of Hawke’s Bay Map
Regional Strategy Project – Supply Chain Mapping
Supply chain mapping is one of the five regional projects that have been successful in attracting NZ Trade and Enterprise Regional Strategy Funding for projects with significant regional benefit. The projects are underway and run for one year.
The project involves mapping the end to end supply chain linkages across major industry sectors in Hawke’s Bay. Project management is by Venture Hawke’s Bay with support from the EIT and local industry.
The study will look across businesses and major industry sectors, their suppliers, through transport and infrastructure, to customers at each level. Mapping will assess the opportunities, gaps bottlenecks and risks in these supply chains. For agricultural products this is commonly referred to as a ‘farm to plate’ approach.
The key benefit expected from the project is building a more robust platform for improved business collaboration and co-ordinated export led growth. Other results expected are improved customer service, and overall cost reduction.
“We are only as good as our weakest link, and this project aims to strengthen the links in the export supply chains for Hawke’s Bay businesses,” says Venture Hawke’s Bay’s Innovation and Productivity Manager, Don McLeod.
The leadership group for this project has representation from major industry sectors in the region, with McCains, Pan Pac Forest Products, the Port of Napier, Wineworks, Pipfruit NZ, Future Products Group and the EIT on board. There is also representation from the meat industry, the region’s largest industry sector by GDP, and transport and logistics – the ‘glue’ of any international supply system.
Sponsors confirmed so far are the Port of Napier, Pan Pac Forest Products, and Pipfruit NZ. EIT business students will assist the Venture Hawke’s Bay project management team with research, and case study development.
The businesses to be mapped in the study will be selected from key industry sectors. During the mapping process, an assessment tool is being developed to assist other regional businesses and their suppliers at the conclusion of the project.
Agriculture forestry and fishing make up 17.3% of the region’s GDP, manufacturing 26.2% of which food and beverage constitutes 16.2%, and transport and storage 3.2%.
“Together these three industry sectors make up close to half of the region’s $4.4 billion GDP, but are worth much more if we extend the supply chain relationships to include product and service providers to these businesses, and downstream activities such as retailing,” says Mr McLeod.
Amongst the larger supply chain challenges for Hawke’s Bay, as a largely weather dependent producer region, is managing local industry trade and exports around the significant volume, often highly seasonal commodity products.
“Container volumes through the port can vary by up to three times between the low months of winter, to the March to May peak season months”, the Port of Napier’s Chief Operating Officer, Chris Bain says.
“Making these business connections for world class supply chain management will be crucial to our export-led business growth in the future” says Mr McLeod.
Project updates will be posted on the Venture Hawke’s Bay website.
18 May 2010 - Hawke’s Bay to be showcased at Tourism Rendezvous New Zealand (TRENZ)
As part of its international marketing strategy Venture Hawke’s Bay will be showcasing Hawke’s Bay at the 2010 Tourism Rendezvous New Zealand trade show held at Auckland’s ASB Showgrounds during the 24th-28th May.
Known as TRENZ the show is managed by the Tourism Industry Association (TIA) and brings together over 1200 tourism representatives from New Zealand and around the world. These representatives include travel buyers, tourism operators, cruise liner agents, Regional Tourism Organisations and international media.
The show offers an excellent opportunity to promote the Hawke’s Bay region and its export ready product to the travel trade during pre-booked one on one appointments held throughout the week.
Showcasing alongside the regional Hawke’s Bay Wine Country stand is The Crown Hotel Napier and Mangapapa Petit Hotel.
Michael Wan, Venture Hawke’s Bay’s Regional Promotion and Marketing Manager says “TRENZ is a key promotional channel with the aim of increasing Hawke’s Bay’s inclusion into travel trade brochures, itineraries and portfolios. It supports our drive for increased global awareness and international visitor growth.”
This will be the 10th year that Venture Hawke’s Bay has attended this event to promote Hawke’s Bay to the travel trade.
Venture Hawke’s Bay’s international marketing strategy includes an extensive media programme and has successfully pitched for 17 international media to visit Hawke’s Bay prior to TRENZ.
Arriving Wednesday the 19th for 2.5 days, the media represent a variety of international travel trade and consumer titles from markets including the UK, North America, China, Thailand, Singapore, Europe, Japan and India. To date this is the largest international media group to visit Hawke’s Bay.
The group will experience a wide range of Hawke’s Bay product, scenery, wineries, restaurants and visitor activities before continuing onto Taupo. “The fantastic uptake of this media famil is testament to the international appeal of the region” says Wan.
18 May 2010 - Australian Wine Expert to share research with Hawke’s Bay
Venture Hawke’s Bay in association with EIT and Hawke’s Bay Winegrowers have secured Dr. Paul Smith- Research Manager for Industry Applications, Australian Wine Research Institute to present to a group of 60 Hawke’s Bay’s wine makers and growers.
Dr Smith will speak about his recent research on grape phenolics and tannin chemistry and their contribution to wine composition and sensory properties. The session presents an excellent opportunity to hear about current findings that have a direct impact on our wines and consumer perceptions. He will also participate in a panel discussion with regional winemakers including Te Mata Estate, Craggy Range and Malcolm Reeves who is the senior lecturer at EIT.
The session will be held at EIT, Room R113 on Wednesday 19th May between 9am-11am.
Dr. Smith received his PhD in Chemistry from Flinders University (2000), where he undertook research into organic synthesis of bridged, bicyclic amines using free-radical techniques. For his post-doctoral research, Paul first worked at CSIRO Molecular Science division in Melbourne. Subsequently, his interest in aspects of molecular recognition and drug-discovery led him to take up a NH&MRC-funded research position with the Department of Clinical Pharmacology at Flinders University, where he studied structure-function relationships of human drug-metabolising enzymes (2001-2003), before joining the Tannin team at the Institute.
Dr Smith will spend some time touring some of the regions exemplar red wine producers and will spend time with EIT faculty and students involved in winemaking.
Diane Marshall, EIT’s Head of School Viticulture says “We are delighted to have someone of Paul’s calibre and knowledge in the region to meet with Hawke’s Bay winemakers and EIT students”.
Venture Hawke’s Bay have funded and facilitated the session through their partnership with FRST (Foundation for Research, Science and Technology). The aim of the session is to provide regional winemakers with up to date science findings, to stimulate discussion and explore research and development project potential that could be supported through TechNZ.
TechNZ is FRST’s business investment programme which has $50 million available annually to businesses undertaking research and development projects. Funding can be accesses through Venture Hawke’s Bay who deliver the TechNZ and Global Expert programme to Hawke's Bay and Gisborne businesses.
5 May 2010 - Grabaseat giveaway hits the streets of Hawke’s Bay
Grabaseat is hitting the streets of Hawke’s Bay on Thursday 6 May to do what it does best – offer cheap seats and give away great prizes to the locals.
The grabaseat campervan will be roaming the streets of Napier and Hastings throughout the morning and giving away individually numbered boarding passes to the people who can find them – and they won’t be hard to miss in their flash new green campervan!
“We want to really get amongst the Hawke’s Bay locals and encourage everyone to come and get their hands on one of our boarding passes” said grabaseat Manager, Duane Perrott. “We’ll be giving away flights to Aussie and around New Zealand. All you have to do is be at a specified location with your boarding pass at 12:30pm and if your number comes up you could be off to destinations like Aussie or Hokitika” says Perrott.
People who want to win free flights should listen to the Classic Hits breakfast crew from 7-10am on Thursday to find out where to pick up a boarding pass from the grabaseat team and the specified location for the prize draw.
The giveaway is linked to promotional activity Venture Hawke’s Bay has been working on with grabaseat. The promo will complement the current activity happening around the domestic marketing campaign ‘Everything Under the Sun”.
Activity started on the 27th April and included a “Grabaseat takeover” with fares into Napier and a grabaseat Weekender“ to Napier on the 5th May.
Michael Wan, Venture Hawke’s Bay’s Regional Promotion and Marketing Manager says “We are thrilled to be able to further raise the profile of Hawke’s Bay to potential domestic visitors by working in partnership with grabaseat on this exciting promotion”