Te Papa has won the Heritage and Culture Award at the 1999 New Zealand Tourism Awards, which were announced last night in Queenstown.
Te Papa’s Chief Executive, Dame Cheryll Sotheran, said that the award affirms Te Papa’s vision for a bicultural museum that tells the great stories of New Zealand in ways which are accessible and appealing to a huge cross-section of the public, both from within New Zealand and overseas.
'Te Papa has shown that museums don’t have to be boring places accessible only to a small, elite audience. They can have broad, international appeal without compromising traditional standards of scholarship. The public is a lot more sophisticated than some people might suggest. Visitors are very demanding and rightly so. And they vote with their feet.
'Last night’s award reflects the hard work and absolute dedication of the team at Te Papa and I feel very proud.
'Te Papa has been largely responsible for an increase in visitation to Wellington, formerly not a popular tourist destination. We work in close partnership with Totally Wellington, Centre Stage, and New Zealand’s Leading Attractions as well as with our wonderful sponsors such as Air New Zealand. Our small Marketing and Tourism team is also very successful at promoting Te Papa within New Zealand and overseas,' Dame Cheryll said.
Since opening in February 1998, approximately 2.8 million people have visited Te Papa. Just under half (40 per cent) were domestic visitors and a further 23 per cent were international visitors.
Te Papa’s exit surveys reveal that domestic visitors came from a wide range of locations. A quarter of the visitors from outside the Wellington region were from Auckland. Just over 12 per cent were from Christchurch, 7 per cent from the Manawatu, 6 per cent from the Hawkes Bay, 6 per cent from Hamilton and 5 per cent from Otago. International visitors also come from a wide range of locations including Scandanavia, Mexico, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. Some 29 per cent were from the United Kingdom, 22 per cent from Australia, and 13 per cent from the United States.
Some 56 per cent of all visitors from outside the Wellington region said they would visit Te Papa again in the next 12 months and 98 per cent stated they would recommend Te Papa to others.