Bright Lights, Big Money |
This far off the beaten path, it’s hard to diversify tourism past the old standbys, hunting and fishing. But northern tourism operators are finding new ways to keep ’em coming
By Stephan Burnett
Last year Don Morin’s Yellowknife-based Aurora Village played host to between three and four thousand Japanese tourists. Each one spent an average of $2,000 to $2,500 for the opportunity to witness aurora borealis – the fabled northern lights – in the nighttime sky. That’s the kind of money the north is happy to see at any time, but especially in the dead of winter, when the nights are long, the temperature well below zero and the tourist trade, until recently, in hibernation.
“There’s a 95% chance of seeing the aurora here and when compared to anywhere else, it’s quite a bit higher,” says Morin, a former premier of the Northwest Territories. Working in partnership with major tour companies in Japan, Aurora Village markets itself as one of the few places in the world where aurora viewing can be done in combination with an introduction to aboriginal culture. Aurora Village comes complete with a teepee viewing site, dog team tours, snowmobile rides and snowshoe walks as well as caribou viewing.
“The teepees are insulated with wood stoves and some hold 50 and some 24. They were made in Edmonton. The tourists use them to warm up and have hot drinks, but they’re standing outside watching aurora mostly,” Morin explains.
The huge distances from major markets, the cost and difficulty of northern travel, a short summer season and undeveloped infrastructure on the ground have long limited northern tourism largely to hunting, fishing and other rough-hewn outdoor pursuits. But operators like Morin are moving the industry beyond Hemingwayesque adventure. Aurora viewing, northern cruises, Inuit art tours and even tourism themed around the region’s burgeoning diamond industry represent promising market niches.
Conservative estimates place the value of the tourism industry in Canada’s three northern territories at around $268 million per year. The Yukon, which benefits from the best road access, takes in $160 million per year, while in the Northwest Territories the market is worth $100 million. The Nunavut tourism market is still in its infancy, recording just $8 million in receipts annually.
Of the $100 million of tourist dollars recorded annually in the Northwest Territories, aurora viewers invest $12.5 million every year. These visitors, mostly from Japan, brave the cold of the sub-Arctic winter and travel halfway around the world simply for a chance to catch a glimpse of what many Canadians take for granted. In just a few years the business has grown into the second largest earner of tourism dollars (excluding business travel) in the NWT. The largest market continues to be the traditional sport of hunting. In 2004-2005, $17.3 million was spent by hunters in the territory. Fishing is the region’s third largest tourism draw, accounting for $7.4 million in spending throughout 2004-2005.
Remoteness and short seasons both weigh against further growth in the hook and bullet market, however. Northern outfitters also worry about these traditional markets going out of vogue with a new generation of tourists. Revenue trends confirm outfitters’ worries. Fishing revenues have slowly but steadily declined in the NWT over the past five years while hunting revenues are off by $1.6 million since 2001-2002.
Yukon: Adventurous future, historic past
Unlike the rest of the North, the Yukon boasts road access to virtually every community. Kluane National Park is a huge draw, being a United Nations-designated World Heritage Site with the world’s largest non-polar ice cap. Because of Yukon’s rivers, whitewater rafting, paddling and canoeing are other big draws. Plus there’s the historical draw of Dawson City and its Klondike Gold Rush.
Culturally, Whitehorse has cultivated a rich arts community, says Stephen Dunbar, owner of Yukon Pride Adventure Tours and a director for the Tourism Industry Association of the Yukon. With tourism being a major component of the overall economy in the Yukon, it makes sense that the government there makes major efforts to boost business.
“Individual tourism companies in the Yukon can apply to have 50% of their marketing budget refunded by the government,” says Dunbar. Being a “receptive tour operator,” Dunbar plans to market the best of what the Yukon has to offer to a specific market niche. “I opened up last October and my market niche is the gay and lesbian market,” he says. In April, Dunbar attended four trade shows catering to the gay and lesbian market in West Hollywood, Seattle, Boston and New York. Apart from destination-specific trade shows, Dunbar says the Internet is another huge factor in marketing to the gay and lesbian community.
“I’m finding a lot of interest in an eco-tour package for four to five days and then on to the Dawson City music festival that runs near end of July.”
Even Yukon operators like Dunbar must grapple with what, for many would-be visitors, is a prohibitive cost of getting to their destination. “The cost of airfare within Canada is traditionally more than from other countries [though] now our rates are down thanks to Air North,” says Dunbar.
Condor Air, a German airline, is another carrier helping to keep costs down and ferry passengers into the Yukon. Starting this summer, Condor will be offering three flights per week coming directly from Frankfurt into Whitehorse.
Cruising pristine northern waters
Another company operating out of northern Quebec is beginning to carve its own unique piece of the northern tourism pie. An engineer with experience in Arctic ship navigation, Dugald Wells was giving a talk on the potential opportunities for polar cruising in 2003 when representatives of Makivik, a nonprofit organization owned by the Inuit of Nunavik, northern Quebec, approached him. The result of their conversation was Cruise North Expeditions. Makivik is the majority shareholder of the company with 75% equity while Wells represents the remaining 25%.
Wells says that in the past there was very little benefit to northerners from other cruises that have sailed through northern waters, stopping at aboriginal villages. “Ships would arrive on their doorstep and there wasn’t a great relationship with the community,” he says.
For a relatively small up-front investment – $500,000 – Makivik and Wells were able to get into the cruise line business. The ship is leased and a relationship was forged with a travel operator. The venture first set sail in 2005.
“We launched in January of last year and by July we ran 10 cruises on a ship holding 66 passengers at an occupancy rate of close to 65%,” says Wells. Eight regular cruises were run along with another for local people. A final trip was made before freeze-up to clean an abandoned excavation site, transporting leaky oil drums south.
The company uses Kuujjuaq, Quebec, Nunavik’s largest community, as its home port. Cruise North’s sister company, Makivik-owned First Air, flies daily into Kuujjuaq. “We cruise the Hudson Strait and into the little communities along the way and typically do a loop back to Kuujjuaq,” says Wells.
A nine-day cruise with the company starts at $3,500 US and includes return airfare to Montreal. This upcoming season Cruise North plans to upgrade to a ship twice the size of the vessel used in its maiden season. “We will be able to house 122 passengers so it’s a big upgrade. It’s a nicer vessel and all the cabins have washrooms,” Wells says. “We’re thrilled with the start-up although you never know what will happen tomorrow but so far we’ve seen no negative effects and we’ve already booked 80% of our 2005 revenue [for the 2006 season].”
Marketing aurora
The Northwest Territories is not the only region cashing in on the aurora market. Northern Alberta’s Fort McMurray region is seeing advances in this niche as well. In mid-to-late February, Johan Louw, owner of Edmonton’s Alta-Can Aurora Tours played host to 634 Japanese aurora tourists. Mother Nature came through for Louw and the tourists with the first group having one night of aurora viewing and the second group experiencing two nights of the northern lights show.
The trip marked the first occasion when flights were chartered directly from Tokyo and Osaka to Edmonton with the all-inclusive fares running close to $1,700, Louw confirms.“We’ve been working in Japan for 10 years. We go twice a year for promotions and in the fall when we came back, we knew the tour was on and we blocked space in Fort McMurray.” Five companies booked Louw’s first charter and another three companies booked a second. Each company was looking to provide a distinctive tour and Louw reports there were some logistical challenges to surmount but in the end, all the booking companies were happy. “They are interested in doing it again,” he states.
Professor Shigeyuki Minami, one of the leading aurora researchers from Osaka City University and head of its electrical engineering department was brought in as an emcee for the event. “He gave a lecture every night at one of our viewing sites,” says Louw.
Apart from having to compete with his counterparts in Yellowknife, Louw has also had to battle through the international travel industry’s precipitous drops as a result of 9/11 and the 2003 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome.
“After September 11 we had a number of losing years and many went out of business. This charter has been a great plus. This is our tenth season and although we have to compete with Europe, the Yukon and the Northwest Territories… after 10 years we’ve established ourselves as a quality niche providing quality tours.”
