Create attraction from the festival

Along with traditional festivals, modern festivals held in localities are becoming tourist attractions. In recent years, some provinces and cities have built new festivals, incorporating regional characteristics, combining many elements that are both traditional and modern enough to suit the needs of the majority of tourists.

When it comes to festivals, it is impossible not to mention Hue - the Festival City of Vietnam with over 500 festivals related to the royal court, folklore, tradition, and religion. Last June, the Hue International Arts Festival 2024 concluded its 7-day event with positive numbers, welcoming more than 100,000 visitors. Revenue from tourism services during this time reached 159 billion VND.

After 24 years of innovation and creativity, the Hue Festival brand has become a highlight in the tourism picture of the ancient capital of Hue. Chairman of the People's Committee of Thua Thien Hue Province, Mr. Nguyen Van Phuong, said that this event not only has typical art programs, representing the imprints of many domestic and international cultures for tourists to participate in, but also has royal festivals, folk festivals... which have been painstakingly recreated, preserved or new festivals suitable for the trend, meeting the enjoyment needs of the public. This is also the unique feature that has created the Hue Festival brand over the past 24 years.

If the Hue Festival is a place where cultural spaces imbued with the ancient capital converge, the Da Nang International Fireworks Festival is a “party” of top-notch lights, combined with music and iconic images of Da Nang. Held since 2008, this has become a cultural and artistic rendezvous, attracting tens of thousands of tourists to the city along the Han River each year.

This year, the Da Nang International Fireworks Festival with the theme Cultural Essence continues to attract teams from 8 countries. Cultural stories told through the art of light always bring strong creative inspiration, arousing overwhelming emotions in visitors. In June 2024 alone, when the Da Nang International Fireworks Festival took place, the number of international visitors to Da Nang achieved an impressive increase of over 40% and exceeded the same period in 2019; the city's revenue from accommodation and food services is estimated at VND 2,523 billion, an increase of 27% over the same period in 2023.

Combining culture with tourism, besides Hue Festival, Da Nang International Fireworks Festival, there are also Da Lat Flower Festival, Ha Long Carnival..., which have become unique cultural spaces, converging the quintessence of tradition and modernity. That also demonstrates creativity based on resources to promote the cultural industry.

In the southern region, the recent Ho Chi Minh City River Festival 2024 brought in VND4,250 billion in revenue for Ho Chi Minh City tourism. According to reports from travel agencies, the number of visitors during the festival increased by 40-50% compared to normal. Not to mention, the program quickly created a wave on social networks when it attracted more than 157,100 interactions and 36,500 discussions right after the opening night.

It can be seen that with the potential of culture and natural resources with many advantages for developing new festivals, many localities have actively invested in activities to enrich the festival, creating good impressions in the hearts of tourists. This is the important point to attract visitors back to the land on each occasion of the festival. Especially with festivals held annually, building identity as well as creating unique experiences associated with the cultural characteristics of the land will be the strong point for the festival to create its own features, not mixed with festivals in other regions.

On the other hand, choosing to create a large-scale event that has been painstakingly organized over many years like the Da Nang International Fireworks Festival is also a very welcome approach. However, to do that, it is necessary to depend on many factors such as local characteristics, organization costs... to ensure the meticulousness to reach the international level, and more importantly, to build a brand for the city, aiming to increase tourism revenue.

According to tourism experts, to develop festival tourism, it is necessary to select a few typical, unique, and valuable festivals to invest systematically in terms of content, scale, organization time, and connection with other destinations in the province to form complete tours for tourists. These festivals need to be selected based on the importance, nature of the festival, the value of the relic; at the same time, based on the time of the festival, the ability to connect with destinations in the province to form tours.

It is important to do a good job of promoting the festival to tourists. At the same time, grasp tourism trends and tourist needs to promote customer markets suitable for the product; connect with travel businesses to organize tours to bring tourists to the festival; organize a variety of services to serve tourists when they return to the festival.

Turn festivals into sustainable tourism products

One of the prominent trends in global tourism today is sustainable and responsible tourism. Developing festival tourism is opening up many opportunities for many countries, including Vietnam, to improve competitiveness and sustainable growth. Vietnam identifies cultural tourism as a leading important product line in the "Vietnam Tourism Development Strategy to 2030", "Vietnam Tourism Product Development Strategy to 2025, with a vision to 2030".

Therefore, tourism associated with festivals is a complementary, outstanding and attractive product, enhancing the experience for tourists.

According to MSc. Hoang Thi Thu Hang - Institute of Cultural Studies (Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences), festivals attract tourists and create festival tourism. Tourists are attracted by many factors, the most important of which is the discovery of cultural characteristics of each region, which are performed in festival events. In addition, when participating in festival tourism, tourists can attend events with a festival atmosphere, meet people with similar interests and learn more about the cultures of different communities.

However, to build a modern festival as a highlight to attract tourists to the locality is not an easy task. The problem for traditional festivals as well as new festivals organized by localities in recent years is how to avoid duplication and have their own mark.

Director Le Quy Duong - Chairman of the International Theatre Festival and Cooperation Committee of the International Theatre Association - ITI/UNESCO, said that festivals need to prioritize the preservation and development of heritage. Each festival needs to be planned, researched, surveyed, and thoroughly understood about culture, history, and heritage to highlight the unique identity of each region, recreating history, culture, and heritage vividly and unmistakably.

If we can exploit festivals based on the cultural and natural characteristics of the land such as the Ban Flower Festival in Dien Bien, the Buckwheat Flower Festival in Ha Giang, we can both ensure the preservation of natural beauty and be associated with the characteristics of the land. However, not all localities have such natural advantages. For example, Tuyen Quang, a mountainous province in the North, does not possess many scenic spots but is still famous for the Thanh Tuyen Festival, which takes place annually on the 15th day of the 8th lunar month.

Since its first organization (in 2004) until now, this is a unique cultural event that has become a national and international tourism product. The festival has become famous throughout the country for the uniqueness of its lanterns and lanterns with "super-huge" sizes. The Vietnam Guinness Book of Records has certified that "Thanh Tuyen Festival has the most unique and largest lantern models in Vietnam".

To achieve such an achievement, the important point is that the festival has attracted the attention of many people inside and outside the province, creating excitement for those who have experienced it and arousing in them the desire to return every time the Mid-Autumn Festival comes.

Therefore, the most important thing of any festival is the contribution of the community. The role of the community in practicing the festival is very important. Therefore, to know whether the festival is big or not, whether it is really welcomed and exists for a long time or not, we need to look at the support of the people. The festival must really attract, become a place for people to have fun together, to live together for a certain period of time to create the nature of the festival.

It should also be noted that to build a festival as a tourism product, a large investment is needed. According to Mr. Hoang Van Khanh - Director of Vietravel Hue Branch, attracting visitors to a festival is not easy. First of all, it is necessary to clarify the organization of the festival or event. With the view of organizing a festival purely, it will stop at the level of a form of living of local residents, only attracting a small number of visitors to learn about the festival.

When considering organizing a festival as an event, it is more systematic, has services, experiences and revenue. Besides, it is also necessary to clarify which type of visitors choose the festival, to focus on promoting attractive solutions.

In order for modern festivals to truly become tourism products that highlight localities, in addition to the efforts of each province and city, there still needs to be support from policies to help localities have more resources to build and organize festivals, aiming to promote tourism and increase economic benefits for the country.