Tourism

The Lord of the Rings movie set in the small town of Matamata is now New Zealand’s third largest tourist destination, bringing in around $78m to the Matamata-Piako district annually and tourists from around the globe.

Visitor Solutions has worked with the Hobbiton site since soon after its inception. For this current project we were commissioned to conduct research on behalf of the Hobbiton Movie Set management team and board.  The research aimed to better understand visitor perceptions and behaviour when visiting the Hobbiton precinct and Shire’s Rest during one of the attraction’s peak visitation periods.  Several recommendations were suggested on the site’s visitor flows, guides and key areas both on-site and back of house. Visitor Solutions also assisted with the development planning for facilities such as the Hobbiton shop.

When the movie set was rebuilt for The Hobbit, a joint venture was formed between the Hobbiton movie set and Peter Jackson himself.  The site went from 25,000 visitors per year to 600,000 visitors per year.

Te Rerenga Wairua is a wahi tapu, a sacred site, and is regarded by Maori as one of the most culturally significant places in Aotearoa. The New Zealand Government considers it one of the top four historical sites in the country.

The Ngati Kuri and Te Aupouri peoples are the acknowledged kaitiaki, or guardians, for Te Rerenga Wairua. They have the cultural responsibility to ensure the area is protected from inappropriate developments and environmental degradation, and that the site is respected by visitors. The site’s historic lighthouse has also become a visual icon for both Northland and New Zealand.

Since 2000, a culturally appropriate restoration and redevelopment of the site has been under way, in a partnership of related businesses, iwi, the Department of Conservation and Council. Safeguarding the spiritual and historical integrity of the site and its internationally unique ecology is of the utmost importance.

Work completed to date has included visitor research, two feasibility studies, site planning, community consultation, visitor facility concept development and the formation of a project control group (PCG). Visitor Solutions was also a member of the project’s project control group.

Stage one of the project (car park, tracks and environmental restoration) won the Master Builders Association National Tourism and Leisure Gold award, and the Best in Category award in 2009.

This multi-disciplinary project was undertaken for a number of stakeholders. It examined a series of opportunities in cultural outdoor recreation activities (such as guided walking and kayaking), and in cultural tourism development.

The project was designed to provide a strong research base for strategic business planning and visitor experience creation. It involved undertaking 2,500 questionnaire surveys, 30 focus group sessions plus a series of one-on-one visitor interviews.

This project remains one of New Zealand’s largest cultural tourism research projects. The first visitor product to emerge from the research: Footprints Waipoua. Featuring night time forest walks, guided by local Maori who interpret the native forest and landscape, Footprints Waipoua was immediately selected as one of the world’s top 100 international eco tourism experiences in Lonely Planet’s Code Green — Experiences of a Lifetime.