The Economic Impact of the UK Film Industry - BFI - British Film ...

7.5. How much is film tourism worth to the UK?
Economic Contribution of the UK Film Industry
July 2007
It is clear that there is a well-documented impact of film in encouraging tourism. However, the overall
value of this contribution to the UK economy is not something that has often been quantified. Total
tourism spending by the 32 million overseas visitors to the UK amounted to £15.4 billion 25 in 2006, and
this is estimated to have directly supported 160,000 jobs 26 . But how much of that tourism activity can be
attributed to UK films?
In our 2005 report, on the basis of extrapolating results from detailed case studies that assessed the
impact of two particular films, we estimated the impact of UK film on tourism may have risen from £400
million to £1.6 billion over the proceeding decade. These figures equate to between 4% and 12% of the
value of total international tourism.
A study by Riley, Baker and Van Doren (1998), in which they review the impact of 12 US films on visits to
specific locations of attractions popularised by the films, provides statistical evidence on the value of the
impact of film on tourism. They examine data on visits to each site for ten years prior to a film’s release
and, where available, for five years following the release. Their results are presented in Figure 7-2. They
show that there is a statistically significant difference 27 between the increases in visitors that a location
experiences and what might have been expected by extrapolating previous trends in visitor numbers.
They conclude that “…the span of movie inducement lasted for at least 4 years and increased between 40
and 50%.”
Taking the anecdotal evidence and the results of Riley et al presented in Figure 7-2 perhaps suggest that
the estimate of the impact of film tourism in our 2005 report is conservative. However, the 12 movies in
the Riley et al study where chosen specifically because they were a box office success and the movie had
an icon clearly associated with an accessible destination. This implies that they are exactly the type of
films that will have the greatest impact on tourism and so cannot be considered as representative of all
movies. Given this, we consider the figure used in our previous report to be a reasonable estimate of the
impact. However, we would recommend that primary research is undertaken in the future to provide the
robust statistical evidence required to verify these estimates.
25
Source: ONS travel and tourism statistics
26
Source: Oxford Economics estimate based on share of overall tourism demand in the UK (derived from WTTC 2006
Travel & Tourism Economic Research).
27
Significant at the 95% level
44