New York is enjoying a boom in UK visitors off the back of an exchange rate of almost $2 to the Pound.
The city saw a 12% increase in UK visitors last year compared with 2005. The 1.2 million who travelled from the UK were three times the number from Germany, the second-biggest European market to New York.
Yet UK arrivals to the US as a whole appear not to be growing. George Fertitta, chief executive of New York marketing agency NYC & Co said the market as a whole was “flat at best”.
New York launched its first promotion in the UK in November, placing advertisements on the London Underground. Now it is looking to win more visitors from across Europe. Since January NYC & Co has opened offices in Scandinavia, Spain, Moscow and Amsterdam.
A grant of $15 million dollars a year in additional funding from the Mayor of New York has swelled the company’s coffers by 50%.
Some of the cash will go on the forthcoming opening of offices in Japan and China, and some on a first worldwide advertising campaign this summer. The UK can expect a TV advertising campaign this autumn, although no details have been settled.