06/07/2005

Archived item. This item is published here for historical reasons. The information below may be out of date.

New Executive to Market South Dublin County

“South Dublin County to position itself as a Business Tourism capital in Ireland”

A NEW full-time tourism executive has been appointed to oversee the promotion, marketing and administration of the tourism company for South Dublin County.

In January of this year the interim county tourism board formally established South Dublin County Tourism Ltd and recently the company installed a full-time executive.

Marguerite Osborne has arrived after previously working with Laois LEADER Rural Development Company for nearly three years as a Tourism Development Officer while prior to this appointment completed an MSc Rural Tourism Development in University College Dublin. In her capacity as executive, Ms Osborne said her aim will be to establish and develop the county’s young dynamic reputation and business tourism potential. She said: “We will be mainly concentrating on business tourism but we will be looking at leisure and recreational activities such as shopping, golf and walking to support our business activities. South Dublin County offers a strong portfolio of approved accommodation including Citywest Hotel, Conference, Leisure & Golf Resort and actually boasts the eight position in tourism accommodation in Ireland.

“One of the first challenges will be to look at ways of getting the name of South Dublin County into the minds of people... we’ll start by making people more aware of how the county is defined.”

Already the tourism board has established a number of subcommittees to look at each of the relevant areas, including hotels, conferences, retail and golf.

In addition, Ms Osborne will be looking after the interests of the participant bodies who have so far been involved in developing the county as a tourist destination.  Already groups such as South Dublin County Council, South Dublin Chamber of Commerce, the Rural Dublin Leader Company and leading tourism interests are involved in promoting the concept through the medium of the tourism board.

The chairman of the Board of Directors of South Dublin County Tourism Ltd, David Kennedy, managing director of The Echo, said that the potential for the success of the tourism project has been greatly enhanced with the appointment of the full-time executive.  He said: “this will mean that we will get a lot more work done. So far, the board has been working at getting things in place and a key component of that was the appointment of an executive.

“The board will continue to meet but we would see Marguerite Osborne as a catalyst to get what we want done... she will be there to help all of the stakeholders, the hotels, retail areas and other interests.” 

Ms Osborne explained that starting with the establishment of a dedicated website and identity programme she is excited about the prospect of helping to build up the county’s reputation as an attractive and popular business tourism destination.