Tourism specialists on tour 4.0: Munich
«Our study trip to Antwerp in the summer had been the previous highlight of the study programme, so there was a high bar to clear,” says Tina Keller. Tina, who has just returned from Munich, is in the fifth semester of her major in Tourism at the Lucerne School of Business. In the framework of the Destination Management module, she was given a glimpse behind the scenes of Munich’s tourism sector. Here, she talks about this international experience.
Thanks to a lot of cheerful banter and a few rounds of the ‘DRS 3’ game, the trip to Munich seemed to fly by; our mood was excellent when we arrived. The first order of the day was a talk given by Ralf Zednik. In his role as the Head of Marketing of “München Tourism”, Munich’s tourism board, he was able to share a great deal of background information about urban tourism. As a city, Munich is increasingly confronted with the problem of overtourism, evidence of which we could witness ourselves during the excursion. Afterwards, we enjoyed our first individual tour of the city. Most of us chose to nip down to the Christkindlmarkt.
On the second day, we attended an eagerly anticipated presentation by Andre Listig and Claudia Bauer. They talked about the organisation of the Oktoberfest. The significance of this traditional festival for the people of Munich was clear from the start. We could tell from the way the speakers talked spoke the event that it is the passion of everybody involved that makes it such a recurring success.
In the subsequent field exercise, it was our turn: we were tasked with rating public spaces according to a set of criteria and to document the process by taking photographs. The goal was to formulate suggestions for improvement and to discuss ways to stage these locations based on our findings.
My personal highlight was scheduled in the afternoon: a visit of the Allianz Arena, the home of FC Bayern München. I’m not much of a football person, but the stadium blew me away. Its scale is incredible, both in terms of size and of the money spent to build and operate the structure. The stands, the locker rooms, the media conference venue: you could tell from their design that this was a top-ranking club. A league of their own, in multiple ways.
Later, in the evening, we were in for a culinary treat. We were served typical German and Bavarian cuisine in a traditional restaurant.
The final item on our agenda was a visit of Therme Erding, Europe’s largest spa just outside Munich. The managing director gave us a guided tour through the spa landscape and provided valuable insight into the wellness tourism industry. We then proceeded to test the facilities extensively.
Then it was time to return home, taking a wealth of impressions of this city and its tourism industry with us. We were all a bit sad that this was to be our final excursion. But we took away so much from it: even closer ties within our class, a Christmassy glow and recharged batteries for the final weeks of the fifth semester. Even Munich couldn’t knock our study trip off its pedestal as our favourite shared experience, but alongside our trips to Berlin, Zermatt and Antwerp, it was one of the highlights of our studies.
