New marketing concept of NP Plitvice Lakes
On March 1, 2017, at the initiative of the Plitvice Lakes National Park Management and LAG Lika, a meeting was held i,n the Park concerning the decision to apply a new marketing concept for the public institution of NP Plitvice Lakes and for other protected areas in the tourist destination of Lika and its Velebit coast. At the meeting were the Director of National Park Plitvice Lakes, the director of the National Park Velebite, the director of the National Park Paklenica, the director of the Barac's cave, the director of the Velebit Nature Park, and the expert services of the National Park and LAG-a Lika, and they have created a revolutionary decision for Lika to promote the entire destination through the marketing channel of our strongest and world famous Plitvice Lakes National Park. The emphasis of this approach will be on the promotion of protected areas, but as we know that about 60% of the destination area is in some form of natural protection, the promotion will cover the entire destination. The Director of the Plitvice Lakes National Park, Mr Anđelko Novosel, clearly stated that such practice would be interrupted and that the Park had to become an important lever for the development of the economy of Lika. We will completely modify the form of indifference of the Park in relation to the destination. The goal is to preserve the National Park as a protected natural site and to develop tourism solely on the basis of a sustainable development model. The presentation of the new marketing concept was held by the Lika LAG leader and the president of the newly founded LIKA DESTINATION cluster, Mr. Tomislav Kovačević, who carefully presented the statistics, as well as the current picture of tourism in the destination and the potentials that can be achieved. He noted that, out of 1.4 million tourists who bought a ticket for visiting Plitvice Lakes last year, nearly one million of them simply "disappeared" or left the destination the same day, which is inadmissible. Those tourists who stayed, however, stayed on average only 1.2 to 1.6 days, depending on the place of stay. The future of tourism development can not be based on the approach so far, he stressed. As a solution to this problem, he proposed a project STAY 3 DAYS IN LIKA. This project originated from the LAG's five-year Integrated Economic Development Project INTEGRA LIKA 2020, which aims at branding Lika and the Velebit coast. As this unique project in Croatia combines a whole range of measures from stimulating domestic food production to rural tourism development, as well as selective forms of tourism. By offering specialized packages on the broadcast market, we will get quality individual arrivals with higher average consumption and longer tourist retention. Also, through the popularization of selective forms of tourism, we will develop all-year tourism. The reason for the recent short stay of tourists in Lika was the unrecognizability of the destination, the weak and uneven tourist offer, the lack of standard of supply and very poor marketing. With the new concept, the entire tourist industry will benefit from the destination, starting from renters, local tourist agencies, caterers and other entrepreneurs, as well as farmers who produce food. The institution's present representatives praised the initiative and expressed their satisfaction that all of them will continue to develop the proposed model.
