This report provides the overall results for the main tourist season, the period from June 27 to September 30. The exit survey is now being managed by the Tourism Research Centre (TRC) at the School of Business of the University of PEI. The TRC wrote this first report based on the data collected, and eight more market segment reports will be released over the following two months, as well as a full-year report at a later date.

"The Tourism Research Centre has redesigned the province’s Exit Survey and, in doing so, has captured a great deal of important and interesting data relating to the 2007 main tourism season. There are many positive results, and we are proud to share these with all tourism operators across the Island, and Islanders alike," said Minister Docherty.

"In 2005, Tourism PEI adopted a new research platform, which was championed by TAC and endorsed by industry and both the federal and provincial governments," David MacKenzie added. "This new methodology for the tourism exit survey delivers on the promise of a new benchmark for tourism performance and enables year-round measurement and the development of the full-year economic impact and visitation estimates."

The results of the exit survey will be made available in a timely manner to all stakeholders who wish to benefit from the results. This first report is being released 15 weeks after the end of the peak tourism season on September 30, 2007. Six additional reports on the main season will be released over the following two months.

"These upcoming reports will highlight specific market segments based on activities, origin, regions visited while on the Island, how long visitors spend in surrounding provinces and their length of stay. This puts us in a position where we will know how to better reach our most important markets to encourage repeat visitation, and which markets have potential to become significant revenue generators for PEI,” stated Mr. Doiron.

The purpose of this first report is to provide an overall snapshot of those who visited PEI during the period from June 27, when the first completed survey was returned, to September 30, the cut-off date used for this report.

The full report is available on the TRC’s Website at www.trc.upei.ca/exitsurvey. Some highlights of the report include:

• Roughly 225,000 travel parties visited PEI during the period from June 27 to September 30, 2007. Of these, 85.3 percent were from other Canadian provinces, 9.8 percent from the United States, and the remaining 4.9 percent from offshore (international) countries.

• One half of Prince Edward Island’s visitors came from the neighbouring provinces of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. Together, they accounted for 50.5 percent of the overnight total.

• Overnight visitors stayed in the province an average of 4.97 nights per trip in 2007. Average length of stay ranged from a low of 3.7 nights for visitors from Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, to a high of 7.4 nights for visitors from New England.

• Overnight pleasure visitors spent a total of $230 million during this period, an average of $1,001.34 per travel party per stay.

• Almost three-quarters (73.3 percent) of overnight visitors were visiting for pleasure. Visiting friends and relatives ranked second as a main reason for visiting, accounting for 19.9 percent of overnight visitors and the remaining 1.8 percent were visiting for “other” purposes which included: attending a wedding, attending a family reunion/meeting, educational study and other purposes.

• Traveling parties consisting of two adults accounted for 51 percent of visitors to PEI. Families with children accounted for 32.0 percent of visitors. The average number of travellers per party was 3.0 people.

• Trips that included a visit to PEI lasted on average 8 nights, of which 4.96 nights or 62 percent of total trip nights were spent on PEI.

• Anne’s Land was the overnight destination for a leading 32.7 percent of all travel parties nights spent on PEI. Charlottetown was a close second and was the overnight destination of 28.9 percent of all travel parties.

• In total, 71.8 percent of travellers during the study period in 2007 were making a return visit to the Island. The remaining 27.4 percent were on their first trip to PEI.

• A leading 24.0 percent of overnight visitors stayed in hotels, motels or resorts. The homes of friends and relatives ranked second (21.9 percent) and campgrounds/trailer parks ranked a close third (21.2 percent). Cottages/cabins were the main type of accommodation used by 19.7 percent of visitors.

“It’s very exciting to have these results available. The Exit Survey is an incredibly valuable tool to find out what our visitors are doing, what they like, where they are from, how much they spend and if they plan on returning. The information captured is immensely important for long-term planning and the strategic direction of Tourism PEI and hopefully for individual operators as well,” said Minister Docherty.

Further information about the report can be obtained from the Tourism Research Centre, School of Business, University of PEI, at (902) 566-6096 or trc@upei.ca.