Bringing wine tourism to Spain

Terraced vineyards in the Priorat region in Tarragona

 

A study carried out by www.winetourismspain.com in the US, Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands, shows over 14 million people define themselves as wine tourists and a staggering 82 million people plan to include a wine activity during their holiday.  

Until recently, it was predominantly Spanish domestic travellers who were aficionados of wine tourism, visiting Spain’s award-winning vineyards and wineries in regions such as Rioja, Rueda, Toro, Murcia and the Duero Valley. The objective now is to entice wine lovers from all over the world to visit take a wine holiday in Spain. 

Bodega in Aranjuez, MadridAccording to Luis Lechuga Nuñez, founder of the Winetourismspain.com website, Spain receives around 250,000 foreign tourists who specifically travel to Spain to visit a winery, this equates to just 0.4% of total tourists visiting Spain and 17% of the tourists who book a Spanish wine holiday. However, 7% of all visitors to Spain admit they would like to participate  a winery tour, which equates to 3.6 million tourists. And it’s these tourists that are the key to stimulating this genre of tourism for the Spanish market.  

Luis explains that to evolve the concept of wine holidays in Spain, the sector needs to focus on developing a program that combines wine, gastronomy and culture together. Capturing visitors who aside from just participating in a wine experience, would also like to immerse themselves in other aspects of Spanish culture. 

The good news is that the project doesn’t need any significant economic investment, because the infrastructure already exists, with rural tourism already well developed, and there is no lack of both hotel and holiday home accommodation in the wine-producing regions. “What we now need to do is look out how we creatively package up and distribute wine tours to the millions of wine aficionados around the world. The internet will definitely play a significant part in the promotion and booking of wine holidays and tours in Spain. 

If you have a holiday rental in a wine producing region of Spain, it’s a good idea to include some detail in your property description page about the wine produced and the local vineyards and wineries. It seems that more and more visitors to Spain are seeking a more cultural, gastronomic and now oenological experience.