ChristchurchNZ outsources city’s brand and destination management project to Canadian company

Photo: ChristchurchNZ

The Christchurch City Council-owned economic development organisation is spending half a million dollars on a global agency to come up with the city’s “narrative” and “destination management plans.”

Despite ChristchurchNZ employing 92 staff members, none had the necessary skills to do the work.

A spokesperson said “ChristchurchNZ is not a creative agency. This type of work, which is primarily creating engaging videos, requires specialised skills and equipment that we don’t have.”

However, the marketing team is made up of 18 people, 16 full-time positions, six of the 18 are marketers, four people on the media, communications and content team, four on the digital team, one graphic designer, one production and planning manager, and the general manager.

ChristchurchNZ was asked why it doesn’t utilise the skills and experience of its eight general managers to do its creative work.

None of them were specialists in producing video-based creative campaigns a spokesperson said.

Although, three general managers were part of the project team that oversees the city narrative and destination management plans work. 

The spokesperson said the contract is held directly with Canadian based company Resonance Consultancy for a total value of $499,275.

$400,000 of this came from MBIE to produce two Destination Management Plans, one for Greater Christchurch and Mid Canterbury and one for Banks Peninsula.

In addition, the city narrative work is budgeted at $100,000, which is coming from Christchurch’s City Identity project budget the spokespersons said.

Other companies Christchurch-based companies Narrative, Creative Agent and Fabriko were also contracted to do the work that ChristchurchNZ couldn’t.

“ChristchurchNZ is taking a strategic approach to the delivery of the city narrative and Destination Management Plans. Instead of doing the two separately we have integrated them into one piece of work as there are many elements in common.

This ensures we are delivering value for money by leveraging the interdependent work required to deliver both the city narrative and Destination Management Plans.”

The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment require each region of New Zealand to produce destination management plans and has funded each regional tourism organisation to do so.

The spokesperson said “because these plans are intended to represent the views of each community, the Government has not placed any pre-determined conditions on ChristchurchNZ about what the Destination Management Plans say.

Although the Government has offered strong guidelines on what it should include.

“MBIE defines destination management as bringing together different stakeholders to achieve the common goal of developing a well-managed, sustainable visitor destination.

It is an ongoing process that requires destinations to plan for the future and considers the social, economic, cultural and environmental risks and opportunities. It is much more than just marketing and promoting a destination, which is just one of the 16 main components that MBIE says is required in a Destination Management Plan.” 

In Christchurch NZ’s latest Ōtautahi Economic Insights Breakfast, a major “take home” was “Māori and Pasifika populations were the backbone of the future economy.” However, no examples were forthcoming from the agency.