An exploration of co-creating South African city brands to revive the tourism industry post a global pandemic

Abstract

City branding is described in the literature as the practice of applying branding theory to create solid and distinct identities for cities. Although this research domain is well established and much has been said about the theoretical foundation of the practice, scholars in the field of branding widely debate the best strategic framework for crafting and implementing a city brand strategy. The variation in successful strategies worldwide suggests that the approach is very subjective to the city in question. Nonetheless, local tourism tends to benefit from this activity. Tourism is a crucial sector of the South African economy and currently (directly) employs more than 700,000 individuals. The ongoing Covid- 19 pandemic brought the tourism industry to a standstill for the greater part of 2020 and 2021. This standstill was due to strict lockdown regulations that enforced social distancing measures in hopes of flattening the infection curve and slowing down the spread of the virus. The South African Minister of Finance urged businesses in the sector to think of innovative ways to revive the industry once they can fully operate and focus on showcasing their readiness to work responsibly during recovery. In response, this study explores the potential of co-creating specific South African cities to aid the revival of the tourism industry post the recent pandemic. To engage with stakeholders and obtain rich insight into their perception of South African cities and how they could be branded to revive the tourism industry, the best-suited research design is interactive, qualitative, incorporates participative action, and is multidisciplinary. The research design entails a deductive approach to the framework and strategies being applied (the literature) while maintaining an inductive approach when using data/insights generated by the research to put forward a stakeholder (co-created) suggestion of how South African cities can be branded to revitalise the tourism in the country. Facilitated co-creation workshops are used, which include various stakeholders representing a particular South African city. The workshops aim to explore their thoughts, feelings, perceptions and ideas on how branding South African cities can revive the tourism industry. A purposive sampling technique is used to identify two groups of twelve participants, each in the respective cities of Johannesburg and Cape Town. The participants are equally divided as general citizens and representatives of local tourism business operations from that city.