Following on from the tourism concepts of recent years, the City of Vienna presented its 2025 Visitor Economy Strategy for the first time in October 2019, under the stewardship of the Vienna Tourist Board. Guided by the principle of ‘Shaping Vienna’, it completely redefines travel as a phenomenon and its effect on the destination, while targeting sustainable development and balancing the needs of both residents and visitors.
Shaping Vienna
Vienna presents its 2025 Visitor Economy Strategy
Visitors: Temporary Viennese
The underlying principle of the visitor economy goes far beyond the standard definition of tourism: it opens up perspectives on the diversity of our guests and the countless ‘temporary Viennese’ who make the city the center of their lives for the duration of their stay. The term ‘visitors’ applies to all guests who live, work or study here, go shopping or stroll the streets, make use of its cultural and leisure facilities, or come to the city on business or to attend meetings. They bring economic benefits, an outside perspective on the capital, and a wealth of influences, ideas and skills with them. Making an active contribution to quality of life, quality of place and quality of experience in the city – to the advantage of residents, other visitors and businesses in Vienna.
Developing strategy for the visitor economy ecosystem
It is not only the visitor economy mindset, but also the consideration of residents' and numerous other stakeholders' attitudes to tourism in the strategy development process that makes this such an unprecedented management approach. In addition to involving stakeholders from the tourism sector and meetings industry, drawing up the strategy involved a broad cross-section of representatives of the visitor economy ecosystem including municipal district leaders, urban and property developers, retailers, mobility providers and universities. An international expert committee also provided insights into the broader picture. Vienna’s 2025 Visitor Economy Strategy was drawn up over a period of 12 months in a stakeholder process led by the Vienna Tourist Board. A full and coherent picture of Vienna’s desired development as a destination over the years to come was drawn up in a total of 21 strategy workshops.
‘Business added value’ and ‘City added value’ providing overarching framework
The guiding principle of our strategy states that the visitor economy needs to add value. For the companies in the ecosystem, this is a question of business added value; for the city and its residents, it means city added value. From a marketing perspective, the task is still to reach out to an audience that is interested in Vienna’s premium offering and which represents a good fit for the city in behavioral terms. The Vienna Tourist Board wants to take specific steps towards achieving its goals in partnership with the City of Vienna and all of the partners in the visitor economy ecosystem in three areas (Place Making & Place Marketing, Meeting Destination Vienna and Smart Solutions).
Six KPIS to measure success*
Progress towards achieving the goals set out in the 2025 Visitor Economy Strategy can be measured using six key performance indicators, which cover revenue and economic impact, resident and visitor satisfaction, and environmental developments.
- Contribution of tourism to Vienna’s GDP to increase from EUR 4bn to EUR 6bn
- Revenue from overnight stays reported by accommodation providers to advance from EUR 900m to EUR 1.5bn
- Visitor satisfaction levels to remain at their current high level, with nine out of ten guests recommending Vienna
- Attitudes to tourism to remain positive at the same high level: nine out of ten residents see tourism in a positive light
- Number of tourism providers certified with the Umweltzeichen ecolabel to double from 112 to 224
- Proportion of arrivals by train (21%) and car (26%) to be reversed
A regional concept to position parts of the city outside the center as new and captivating destinations within the destination; future projects such as a new event venue, the new central bus station and the banks of the Danube; focusing on the meeting destination as a driver for developing the city; positioning Vienna as a night jet hub on the European rail network, and focusing on long-haul journeys in the air travel sector all play a central role in the strategy.
The full 2025 Visitor Economy Strategy – Shaping Vienna document, additional information, explanatory graphics and videos can be found online at https://shaping.vienna.info.
* The defined goals in the 2025 Visitor Economy Strategy were drawn up at a time when the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as its effects on the global tourism industry and Vienna’s visitor economy, could not have been foreseen. At the time of publication, the decision had already been taken to adapt the strategy to reflect the change in circumstances. All updates in the months and years to come will be posted online at https://shaping.vienna.info/en-us/home
