Tourism development plan in the Province of Barcelona

Success story

Tourism development plan in the Province of Barcelona

Service Area: Destination Management
Capabilitiess: Tourism development, Sustainable tourism, Marketing plan, Competitiveness
Client: Diputación de Barcelona
Location: Barcelona, Spain

The project consisted of establishing the potential for tourism development within the province of Barcelona, and elaborating the appropriate strategies and work plan for its correct implementation.

Diputación de BarcelonaIn 1997 the Provincial Council of Barcelona created the Tourism Promotion Office in order to boost tourism development in the province that, until that moment, would only register up to a certain level of activity in the city of Barcelona, Sitges and a few other coastal towns. However, the inland area of the province, traditionally focused on industry and agriculture, hardly registered tourist activity.

The crisis that affected these economic activities made tourism an economic alternative which generated employment and income and that made further settlements in the area possible. Therefore, the Tourism Promotion Office commissioned THR to elaborate a tourism development plan.

The methodology used by THR considered the following elements for the elaboration of the development plan:

  • Developing an agreed tourism development model
  • Structuring the land in tourist clusters
  • Assessing each cluster's tourist potential
  • Prioritising specific tourism products for each cluster
  • Selecting and prioritising geographic markets
  • Setting up 17 competitiveness programmes
  • Designing 15 marketing programmes


Diagram 'Tourism Development Plan'


Plan de desarrollo turístico
Source: THR

One of the most useful and operational conclusions was to structure the province into 23 clusters and establish specific competitiveness and marketing programmes for each of them.

The 3 main results of the project were:

  • Identifying opportunities and possibilities.
  • Choosing the most suitable strategies to exploit them.
  • A specific work plan to implement the strategies and promote zones and products.

Competitiveness Diamond


Diamante de la competitividad

Source: Porter, Michael E.; Competitive Strategy

Would you like to request the advice of our experts?

Contact us without commitment

Success stories

Explore our success stories by: