Reinventing Aberdeen: bid to put the sparkle back into Granite City's tourist industry

Union Street’s silver granite buildings offered a sparkling welcome to tens of thousands of visitors from Edinburgh, Glasgow and beyond who trooped off trains and buses or, if they were very posh, a BEA flight to Aberdeen airport.

So popular was the Granite City that at the height of a busy tourist season there could be as many as six trains arriving every eight minutes, each packed with up to 800 people.

During a golden period of British seaside holidays before continental tourism dawned, the city was one of Scotland’s most popular tourist destinations, while the castles, scenery and golf courses of the surrounding Aberdeenshire countryside kept the visitors coming.

In Aberdeen’s case, an unfortunate delivery of contaminated Argentinian corned beef to a city shop in 1964 proved disastrous. The subsequent typhoid epidemic left 500 people desperately sick, visitor numbers slumped and suddenly Aberdeen’s shining northern star was fading.

Now, however, after decades of enjoying an oil and gas boom that more than made up for the loss of the Edinburgh and Glasgow Fair visitors, the Granite City and Aberdeenshire are preparing to become Scotland’s next big tourist destinations.

Stung by the downturn in the energy sector that saw demand slump for its once-packed hotel rooms, and perhaps slightly envious of Dundee’s rising star as a “must-see” destination, Aberdeenshire’s tourism sector is now seriously upping its game.

Yesterday saw a major step towards the city’s tourism rebirth with the reopening of Aberdeen Art Gallery following a £34.6 million revamp.

Around 5,500 visitors were expected to pour inside the 130-year-old gallery to admire works by Tracey Emin, Henry Moore, Francis Bacon and Monet.

Its 18 galleries offer three times the number of previous exhibits and include displays on nearby Balmoral and its links to Queen Victoria, the empowerment of women and the city’s relationship with the sea.

The gallery’s rejuvenation is accompanied by a host of other multi-million-pound new developments and revamps across the city, from the dramatic expansion of the city’s harbour to welcome mega-size cruise ships, to a new look for Union Terrace Gardens.

Along with the recent opening of the £333 million Event Complex Aberdeen with its conference and venue space, restaurants and two new hotels with 423 new rooms, city leaders believe the city is set to shed a little of its “business only” image to lure a new generation of leisure visitors.

That should be very welcome news for the area’s hotels. From enjoying the comfort of having rooms block-booked months in advance, many were left grasping for customers as oil and energy businesses slumped.

Rooms lay empty, the cost of a night’s stay in luxury hotels designed to meet high demands of big paying customers was slashed. Some, such as the 50-room Highland Hotel on Crown Street, closed.

According to VisitScotland figures, 2017 saw the volume of domestic visitors to Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire fall below 800,000 for the first time, driven by a 67% drop in business travellers.

Meanwhile, BDO’s Hotels Britain report for the year showed the city’s hotels had the worst occupancy rates in the country with more than one-third of rooms lying empty.

It also recorded the biggest drop in rooms yield in the UK, with hotels earning £41.44 per room, down from £47.43 the previous year.

The figures were particularly concerning at a time when rooms yield in Inverness grew by almost 6%, while Edinburgh soared by 10.2%.

Fast-forward to last month, and professional services specialist PwC’s latest Hotels Forecast report brought only some comfort. While a slight recovery in the oil and gas industry led to a 1.4% increase in occupancy rates to 64.5% in the past year, it is far short of the countless “no vacancies” signs at the height of the oil boom when room occupancy rates were in the 80s and 90s.

Despite the rise, revenue per available room was also said to have fallen by 2.1%.

Could Aberdeen’s multi-million-pound investments in visitor attractions and facilities bring the good times back?

“Until around 2015, hotels had ‘no vacancy’ signs up,” says Chris Foy, chief executive of VisitAberdeenshire.

“We were doing very well from corporate business. But the city was hit hard and there have been quite challenging times in recent years.

“However, we are on the cusp of a renaissance in the city. We have seen some game-changing investments in the city and Aberdeenshire which are helping to reposition this part of the country as a short-break destination.

“We are seeing tour operators with clients who are looking for something new, they want a high-quality experience and a high-quality hotel product. Aberdeen has 7,000 hotel rooms and the area has fantastic niche, luxury properties serving high-spending visitors. There’s plenty of capacity, the ‘no vacancy’ signs are down and there are fantastic deals.”

Foy believes Aberdeen and the surrounding areas can capitalise on a growing trend among travellers to embrace lesser-explored “secondary” cities which offer something different to well-trodden tourist centres.

Evidence of that comes from Aberdeen’s recent surprise inclusion in the New York Times list of top 52 places in the world to visit alongside Doha, Los Angeles, Lyon in France, New York, Los Angeles and Tahiti.

Meanwhile, accommodation giant Airbnb has also named Aberdeen as one of its top 20 trending global travel destinations for 2020. The only UK city to appear on the list, it was praised for its “striking cityscape, fine dining and rugged coastal scenery”.

Foy adds: “There’s a realisation that there’s another part of Scotland perhaps not as busy as some other areas. Aberdeen is a thriving energy city which is going through a transformation.”

Evidence of that seems to be around every corner – even at one of Aberdeen’s oldest buildings. Work has started on a major revamp of Provost Skene’s House, built in the mid-16th century – it is to become a visitor attraction where the lives of 100 famous Aberdonians will be celebrated, among them Annie Lennox and Denis Law.

Aberdeen Science Centre (ASC) is also set for a £6m upgrade to the old granite Tramsheds in the city’s Constitution Street, while at the harbour, where for 900 years ships have brought visitors as well as supplies, a £350m expansion scheme is well under way.

Once complete, the harbour will be able to welcome some of the biggest cruise ships in the world. Enterprising local travel agents have already confirmed new routes for the harbour, with vessels offering trips around Britain, to the Baltic States, St Petersburg, Norway and Iceland on the cards, while across Aberdeenshire tour companies are gearing up to cater for an influx of visitors seeking golf, castles and outdoor adventures.

To help the area on its way – and following some criticism that its marketing strategies in the past have dwelled too much on certain other areas – national tourism body VisitScotland has included Aberdeen in a new six-month worldwide “Scotland Is Now” marketing campaign targeting potential visitors from Germany, France, the US, China and the UK.

Meanwhile, hopes are high that the decision to stage the BBC Sports Personality of the Year ceremony at the new Event Complex Aberdeen in December will give the area a national platform for a sport-loving audience.

City leaders are also looking at plans to host the final stage of the Tour of Britain next year and the cycling event’s Grand Depart in 2021 as a potential opening to encouraging adventure and outdoor tourism.

All of this has led to local tourism agency, VisitAberdeenshire, calling for volunteer ambassadors for the area – people who can share their love and knowledge of the northeast to visitors.

“Tourism in the northeast has been dwarfed by oil and gas in terms of the economy,” agrees Councillor Jenny Laing, co-leader of Aberdeen City Council. “Those in the city were happy to service the business market, but the downturn in oil and gas meant companies and their supply chains looked at how to cut their costs, and part of that was around accommodation.

“There’s an increase in the number of rooms available while the market has shifted,” she adds. “We have a great opportunity for tourism, we’re close to the beautiful coast, we have Royal Deeside, golf, castles, but we don’t have any joined-up approach about what we are offering.”

One idea is to present Aberdeenshire as Scotland’s outdoor adventure destination, she points out.

“It’s about us finding a niche for Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire, collaborating and showing we have a good offering for tourists.”

Five hidden gems in the northeast

1. Footdee – locals pronounce it “Fittie” – is a former fishing village just a stone’s throw from Aberdeen Harbour. There are cottages, cobbled lanes and quirky touches, plus fresh seafood restaurants such as the Silver Darling at Pocra Quay serving the catch of the day.

2. Aberdeenshire has 165 miles of coast, towering sand dunes and a good share of championship golf courses – including two of the top 10 oldest courses in the world.

3. Off the beaten track on Royal Deeside sits Loch Muick on the Balmoral Estate which is home to “Victoria’s secret”. Glas-allt-Shiel was built as a quiet widow’s retreat following the death of her husband, Albert, and was where she spent time with her ghillie, John Brown. Nearby is Linn o’ Dee, where the River Dee cuts through a granite gorge creating a torrent of water amid spectacular scenery.

4. Several peaks make up distinctive Bennachie hill on the outskirts of Inverurie, the best known of which is called “Mither Tap”. Climb to the rocky granite summit to see the remains of a historic hill fort and for inspiring views of the surrounding landscape.

5. Aberdeenshire and Aberdeen are home to 263 castles, from Balmoral to the seven-storey pink-turreted Disney-style Craigievar and Slains Castle, said to be the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Scotland’s Castle Trail enables visitors to “bag” up to 19 castles in the area.