Germany: a Multi - Faceted Destination for Cultural Travel

Destination Germany is home to a wealth of cultural and natural treasures. Particularly popular are its 37 UNESCO World Heritage sites. They represent a major travel incentive for international visitors and have helped to make Germany the most popular cultural travel destination among Europeans (source: IPK International). The sales and marketing activities of the GNTB play a key part in this success: the ‘City Breaks/Events’ product line, for example, was developed to capitalise on the culture megatrend as a platform for worldwide campaigns and marketing activities.

Theme years and focal points through to 2019 The 200th anniversary of Richard Wagner’s birth is another focus of the GNTB’s sales and marketing activities this year. Wagner is one of Germany’s greatest composers and music dramatists and left his mark all over the country. The GNTB is using the anniversary as an opportunity to promote specific events in towns and cities where Wagner lived or worked. ‘Brothers Grimm: 200 years of folklore and fairytales’ is another theme of great international interest that is currently a focus for the GNTB’s global sales and marketing activities. Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm became famous around the world for their collection of ‘Children’s and Household Tales’ and their legacy is a major reason for culturally minded travellers to visit Germany.

“Anniversaries of the births of world-famous musicians and poets provide a perfect opportunity to position Germany as a land of art and culture in international markets,” says Petra Hedorfer, Chief Executive Officer of the GNTB. Also featuring prominently in the GNTB’s global press and PR activities for 2013 is the 150th anniversary of the birth of Henry van de Velde, an exponent of Classical Modernism who paved the way for the Bauhaus movement, and the 50th anniversary of the Elysée Treaty.

In 2014 the focus of the GNTB’s international sales and marketing campaigns will shift to UNESCO World Heritage. Germany is currently home to 37 properties that come under the special protection of UNESCO. To build on this key indicator of quality in global tourism, the GNTB will be promoting UNESCO World Heritage sites throughout the year under the banner ‘UNESCO World Heritage – sustainable cultural and natural tourism’.

This will be accompanied by a theme that is particularly relevant to the history of the church, the 600th anniversary of the Council of Constance. At the same time, the 25th anniversary of the peaceful revolution in Leipzig will commemorate a more recent chapter in Germany’s history. In 2015 the GNTB will celebrate the ‘500th anniversary of the birth of Lucas Cranach the Younger’ as part of the Luther decade and also ‘25 years of German unity’. In 2016 the GNTB will turn its attention once again to Germany’s rich bounty of natural treasures, putting ‘Holidays in the heart of nature – Germany’s national parks and nature reserves’ at the centre of its international media work. Activities relating to the Luther decade will culminate in 2017 with the ‘500th anniversary of the Reformation
– religious travel to Germany’. This will be celebrated all over the world with religious and
cultural events, conferences and major exhibitions.

A second focus in 2017 will be the International Garden Show in Berlin. The GNTB has even already selected one of the key themes for its media work in 2019 – the centenary year of the Bauhaus in Weimar.

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presse@germany.travel
www.germany.travel