After a quiet Christmas and New Year, Tuesday saw both of us back at work.\u00a0 As well as updating a lot of the content on our website, Martin started preparing our monthly newsletter…and spent some time being quite domestic, making a pot of chili for our Bird Race planning meeting.<\/p>\n
The Northumberland Winter Bird Race is always an excellent social event.\u00a0 Around dawn on Saturday several teams will set out with the intention of finding and identifying (by sight or sound) as many bird species as possible within the boundaries of Northumberland, North Tyneside and Newcastle upon Tyne.\u00a0 Planning involves mainly deciding which are the most productive sites in terms of species, and working out the most efficient route to visit them during the short daylight hours of early January.\u00a0 At the end of the day all of the teams gather at The Three Horse Shoes and disclose their totals for the day.\u00a0 It’s a relaxed affair, with every team wishing every other team to do well, no ultra-competitive element involved at all \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n
Today brought more planning; this time for some contract work we’re doing this year.\u00a0 Then, a couple of hours ago, a ‘phone call from a PR agency we’ve worked with in the past – “Hi Martin, can you do a press trip on Friday please?”.\u00a0\u00a0Being asked to do a press trip by someone we’ve worked with before is like having a repeat client;\u00a0confirmation that what we deliver is a consistent quality experience that clients trust us to deliver, and PR agencies trust their reputations to.\u00a0 At a meeting in December to discuss the uncertain future of tourism promotion in Northumberland, it was suggested that what we should all do is be creative and arrange press trips –\u00a0PR agencies, accommodation providers, activity providers and visitor attractions all working together to promote Northumberland.\u00a0 It’s slightly worrying that there was even one person in that room who appeared to be unaware that lots of local tourism businesses are doing that already, ably supported by Northumberland Tourism<\/a> and the PR agencies who are engaged by some of the larger businesses.\u00a0 We live and work in a beautiful county, with a tourism industry that has the skills, and the people,\u00a0to ensure it remains sustainable.<\/p>\n