The BeyondSnow Roadshow stops off in Aschau im Chiemgau: Workshop for a tourism mission statement

Over 20 participants, including First Mayor Simon Frank, Head of Tourist Info Herbert Reiter, Tourist Info staff, local councillors and local service providers, took part in the workshop on 10 May 2025. Katharina Gasteiger from the Alliance in the Alps (AidA) network of municipalities moderated the workshop - it took place as part of the BeyondSnow project, in which AidA is involved as a partner. BeyondSnow is an Interreg project dedicated to the question of how municipalities and regions deal with the fact that snow is becoming increasingly scarce.

All participants agree that tourism in Aschau works all year round, even when there is less snow - but there is no overarching vision that everyone shares, no strategy that is politically legitimised. A tourism mission statement is a sustainable investment in the future: it creates standardised communication and a shared vision that everyone stands for. It creates trust and transparency - and thus comprehensibility and openness when it comes to the tourism work of a municipality. A tourism mission statement functions as a compass for decisions and can serve the long-term tourism development of a place. In addition, the formulation of common goals also makes it possible to measure success. Tourism also concerns those who are not directly involved in tourism, because tourism means living space - for guests, but also for locals.

The workshop was preceded by a SWOT analysis within the municipal council: the strengths and weaknesses as well as the opportunities and threats were analysed and put down on paper. It was now up to the workshop participants to add many more points to this analysis from their own perspective. A lively discussion among the whole group was followed by speed dating, in which the vision, values and target groups were discussed in pairs. The results were then summarised.

In further group work, the so-called World Café, the overarching topics were discussed in turn at five stations, each with a moderator: Mountains & Landscape, Leisure & Sport, Health & Wellbeing, Culture & Events and Service & Mobility.

The content is now being incorporated into a tourism mission statement for the municipality of Aschau im Chiemgau, which will be anchored in a municipal council resolution in July and presented to interested citizens in the autumn. The tourism mission statement will contain an overarching vision, a description of the destination Aschau im Chiemgau, the self-image and values, strategic goals (defined according to the topic areas) and the target groups.