Discover England

In 2018+2019 we received funding from Visit England via the Discover England Fund to develop unique and completely new to market 'experiences' based at churches and cathedrals across England.

Response to the project and the developments to ExploreChurches has been extremely positive:

'We can make this an educational tool for our groups department to offer clients new products'
'Can offer us diversity on our Itineraries'
'Offer authentic, educational components to our travellers'
'Cultural attractions our focus, interesting to add to our itineraries'
'Good for ad hoc groups where time not such a problem'
'Tour operators feel it is an opportunity of offer something new and different'

Find out more

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Experience our experiences

Discover our wonderful range of hand picked experiences in sacred places across England.

Visitor guide

Let us tempt you with ideas for itineraries with our regional, festival and themed pages.

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Peruse our gallery

Be wowed by the gorgeous photographs and films we commissioned across England.

Achievements

We aimed to attract international visitors, specifically from the USA, to England. It used ExploreChurches to create a platform to book one off experiences and unique tours at England’s churches and cathedrals and then explore the wider natural, built and community heritage in and around them.

We are targeting long haul visitors, so our campaign will take longer to have a direct impact on visitor numbers.

In nine months the project:

: developed 5 exclusive itineraries up to March 2019, there will be 10 exclusive itineraries by March 2020

: worked with churches, chapels and cathedrals to create 10 exclusive experiences

: created a new area on ExploreChurches, where experiences can be promoted and booked

: created new account models for tour operators and FIT travellers, so they can save favourites, build itineraries and book experiences

: created 10 visitor guide regional pages on ExploreChurches

: welcomed tour operators and destination management organisations to two familiarisation visits

: attended four trade missions

: created over 100 clickable links through from tourism organisation websites

: achieved 40% increase in website visitors

: increased awareness and improved reputation of niche English sectors in overseas markets

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Achievements

Let’s stay in touch.