Four Trust places win prestigious Travel Trade Award
The awards were given by Irish coach tour operator CIE Tours International, which brings visitors from North America to Ireland and the UK. The awards presented to our four properties recognise the quality of the UK’s visitor attractions and are given to those who’ve received a greater than 90% customer satisfaction rating.
Brodie Castle, Culloden, Invereweand Crathes Castle were awarded the Excellence Award based on the feedback of the 15,000 visitors CIE brought to the UK in 2018.
CIE launched its UK awards six years ago, replicating its long-running awards in Ireland. Since then, the numbers of venues and attractions achieving a 90%+ satisfaction rating in the UK has grown from 32 to 71.
In 2018, the company enjoyed a 13% rise in visitors on their UK tours. During the year, their tours visited 184 visitor attractions and 73 hotels across the UK, paying a total of £13 million to their UK suppliers.
An award ceremony was held on 9 April at the Royal College in Glasgow.
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Brodie Castle
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Culloden Battlefield
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Inverewe
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Crathes Castle
Elizabeth Crabill, Chief Executive of CIE Tours International said: ‘The level of customer satisfaction achieved by our suppliers plays a vital role in our success and the aim of our Awards is to encourage them to focus on the clients’ experience and improving standards of service, so it is gratifying to see the increase in suppliers being given 90% plus ratings. All of the recipients play a key role in our success by welcoming our visitors and ensuring that they have a memorable experience.’
‘Our Awards are well recognised and hugely respected in Ireland’, continued Elizabeth Crabill, ‘and it is great to see that the awards have been embraced so quickly in the UK.
‘Travellers from North America are accustomed to very high levels of service, so we run the awards to encourage our partners to focus on continuously increasing the quality of our visitors’ experience. To achieve a rating above 90% from these travellers is very meaningful and the fact that the number of our suppliers in the UK achieving this is rapidly increasing year on year, is a great sign for UK tourism.’
CIE Tours International is Ireland’s leading inbound tour operator, having brought more than 4 million visitors from North America to tour Ireland over the course of its 86-year history.
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