The Mijas Town Hall and business persons in the sector take the first steps within the ‘Golf Marketing Plan’

In January, the University of Malaga delivered the ‘Mijas Golf Marketing Plan’ commissioned by the Town Hall, ready to start implementing the strategic lines studied, in order to promote this sector which is so important for the municipality. Now that moment has arrived. A few days ago, golf entrepreneurs in Mijas and the councillors for Tourism and Sports, José Carlos Martín and Andrés Ruiz (Cs), held a meeting to “learn about their concerns and proposals and to determine, above all, those first measures to be implemented”, explained Martín. “Within the strategic tourism plan we have the golf marketing plan”, Ruiz pointed out. For the councillor for Sports, golf “is a relevant sport within the municipality’s sports planning. We must bear in mind that in Spain we have more than 263,000 federated golfers and in Andalusia more than 43,000. The figures surrounding this sport indicate that we have to support high-level events”, as one of the measures included in the marketing plan.

According to Andrés Ruiz, “golf generates 16,000 jobs in Andalusia and moves more than 1,400 million euros in our community”. Therefore, golf is a key segment for Mijas. Not surprisingly, councillor José Carlos Martín assured that the municipality is a clear reference in this sector: “Mijas has 12 courses, which makes it the largest area providing for golfers in all of the Andalusian community”.

The strategies

The ‘Mijas Golf Marketing Plan’ raises five key aspects that must be worked upon to promote golf tourism, recalled the councillor for Tourism. “Public-private collaboration between companies in the sector and the administration must exist; the creation of the brand that until now has not been unique and which identifi es the entire Mijas golf sector and can differentiate itself from other brands or from other tourist municipalities; a very important issue is to promote this sport among the local population, through a municipal school or something similar; study how the administration can help golf courses from the advertising point of view” and, in fifth place, Martín concluded, reduce seasonality. “Golf has an advantage and this is seasonality, the high season for golf is winter and the low season, summer. We have been working for a long time to break with seasonality and precisely the golf sector gives us that advantage”. In this regard, “we are going to continue supporting great sporting events because these are what we consider the municipality needs. Golf is a sport that brings life to Mijas and provides great relevance at the national and international level”, Ruiz pointed out. In fact, he recalled, “in recent years we have held golfi ng events such as the golf club series, which has been organised for several years and one of the finals is held here on a national circuit”.

Golf in times of pandemic

“It is true that the current circumstances in relation to the practice of sports have led us to make an extra effort to organise and carry out sporting events and in the case of golf the same will happen. We are planning the coming season making sure that we will comply with all the safety protocols in place at whatever moment, but golf is an outdoor sport where social distancing can be maintained, and therefore I believe that even the current circumstance is not going to stop us from taking these important steps to promote golf ”, assured Andrés Ruiz.

“The low economic revenue due to the effects of the pandemic, with Easter Week around the corner and international tourism that does not seem to arrive, is what most concerns the sector right now”, said Martín, following the meeting with the business persons working within the world of golf in our municipality. Therefore, “in the face of this complicated situation, the entire golf sector has to work hand in hand with the local administration, because there are many jobs that depend on this segment”, concluded councillor Martín.

 

Source: Mijas Semanal