Tourist card: what will be the fate of the popular tourist product in Kazan
Will the Kazan tourist center adopt the best from the European leaders City Card?
The Kazan Tourist Information Centre is going to launch the Guest Card of Tatarstan, however, the details of the project have not been disclosed yet. Realnoe Vremya decided to analyze the recent poor experience of Kazan in that sphere and the experience of other cities and countries.
Everywhere, from bus pass to all inclusive
According to the information on the national tourist portals, the tourists cards are spread in most European countries. For example, in Poland, the tourist cards are available in four cities; there is also card that can be used in four cities. In Italy, there are tourist cards in 12 regions out of 20. Tourist cards are claimed to be in many cities of Ukraine: Kiev, Odessa, Lviv, Kharkiv, the Carpathians and on the Black Sea resorts of the Nikolaev and Odessa regions (in fact, however, the card is valid only in Kiev).
The United States has one of the largest networks of urban cards CityPASS: it includes Seattle, San Francisco, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, Southern California, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, as well as Toronto, Canada.
The largest European system dealing with the development of urban tourism cards — European Cities Marketing. The organization offers cards in 40 cities in 21 countries around the world — Amsterdam, Barcelona, Belfast, Berlin, Brussels, Budapest, Copenhagen, Helsinki, Lisbon, London, Paris, St. Petersburg etc.
The guest cards can be developed by the tourist centers of cities jointly with the relevant departments, but in most cases, these projects are promoted by commercial companies: the operator companies conclude contracts with agencies that may be of interest for a tourist. The Standard card includes free or reduced admission to museums. Most often, the functionality of a card includes discounts at hotels, cafes and restaurants. In addition, the operators are trying to provide the cardholders with an unlimited use of city public transport.
The cost of a card depends on the set of bonuses. For example, the city card of Vienna, which is considered to be an expensive city, costs 25 euros for three days. However, a card of Prague is 56 euros. However, the Vienna Card offers only public transport and 210 types of discounts. But Prague Card, in addition to discounts and free travels, offers free entrance to 50 museums and a sightseeing tour of the city. Bolzano Bozen Card in the region with the same name in the Italian Alps offers free entrance to 80 museums throughout the region, transporting by regional trains, as well as public transport and ski lifts, bicycle rental and excursions in the natural parks. And all this happiness is only 28 euros for three days.
It's gone…
First information about the appearance of tourist discount Guest Card of Kazan — a local analogue of the widely applied in Europe and the United States City Pass or City Card — publicly appeared at the end of December 2012. Then it was reported that the Kazan Tourist Information Centre introduced it to attract the attention of tourists to Kazan museums. However, the latter did not show interest in the product: the card offers to visit only five museums, in the remaining ones the tourists were only offered to get a discount.
The draft of the card was developed before the Universiade together with AK Bars Bank, the system 'A friend of the company' and the payment system MasterCard. As the Director General of the Tourist Information Centre of Kazan Natalia Abramovich reported, the city was ready for the launch of the card in May 2011, however, 'due to the fact that this card is different, it deposits money, the process was delayed.'
Indeed, it was assumed that payment by the card was to be made through payment terminals, of the contactless PayPass system, which was freely installed by AK Bars in the stores and restaurants in preparation for the Universiade. They also called the price — 1349 rubles per person, 2299 rubles for two.
In fact, the launch of the card took place in mid-May 2013. For these 1349 rubles a tourist had the opportunity within 14 days from the date of activation to visit the five museums of Kazan, to do five journeys in any public transport, to visit the sightseeing tour of Kazan, as well as to receive discounts when buying entrance tickets to museums, excursions, souvenir shops, restaurants, hotels, shopping centers of the city.
These five journeys — an unprecedented low number of transportations for this kind of cards, at least if you compare the product with similar European card: in most cases, the tourists with a card CityPass or analogues are offered an unlimited use of city transport. These five free entrances to museums is also an offer not very generous. The system, in which such a tourist card is actually a bank one, is also strange. How the card issuing went, especially in the case of foreign residents, for whom it is quite difficult to apply a Russian bank card — for us remains a mystery. The price of the card, 1349 rubles, at a great rate of 40 rubles per Euro in mid-May 2013 was about 33 euros. At the moment, for example, a discount card of Vienna (the Austrians do not skimp in terms of transport — they offer unlimited travel by all transport for three days, but there are no free inputs at all — only discounts at museums and theatres) costs about 25 euros. A similar card of Prague for two days costs € 46, but additionally to travel in urban public transport it includes free entrance to 50 museums, attractions and free transportation to the airport.
The Kazan card even with such a poor set of bonuses did not last long: in 2013, the message about the card stopped appearing, and at the moment the mentions of the product are found only on the website of the project 'A friend of the company' — apparently, due to the fact that they just simply forgot to remove the information.
…but promised to return
The information about the Guest Card of Tatarstan can be found on the website of the Tourist Information Centre of Kazan. According to the description, the card is a loyalty program through which a guest gets nice bonuses and discounts from program partners and 'gets the chance to experience 1001 pleasures of travelling throughout Tatarstan'. It is not known what the representatives of the Center meant under '1001 pleasures', but until now the website offers only 17 places where you can get discounts using this card. They include 13 hostels, a bar, a karting center, the aqua park and the Tourist Information Centre itself. The website also states that at the moment the Guest Card of the Republic of Tatarstan is accessible for use by participants of XXIV Russian Student Spring. The validity of this card is from 1 June 2016 to 1 June 2018. It is promised to be on sale in the fourth quarter of 2016. Also, the potential partners of the loyalty program are welcome to participate in the project. That's it, no other details.
The Tourist information centre of Kazan was established in 2007 in the framework of the city program of development of tourism. As the RATA news, the daily online newspaper of the Russian Union of travel industry, reported, 'the Center will allow you to solve the problems of development of domestic and inbound tourism in the city, formation of modern information and tourist infrastructure and the creation of the image of Kazan as an attractive tourist center.'
Russian analogues of cards: two — in Moscow and three — in St. Petersburg
At the moment, the card can be obtained only in Moscow and St. Petersburg. It is interesting that in both cities there are two systems, operators of which are different legal entities.
WowT PLC offers tourist cards with the names Moscow Pass and Piter Pass Pass. Their competitor — Vektor PLC — offers the project Russia City Pass, which includes Moscow CityPass and St.Petersbrug CityPass. These operators of the tourist cards are in conflict, disputing the rights to the product.
WowT (operates under the brand of Moscow Pass) invites to buy a tourist card, which includes visits to 40 museums and three excursions. In addition, the card offers discounts in some places. A Card for one day costs 1990 rubles, for 3 days — 3490 rubles. The section 'to buy' on the website of the St. Petersburg project of WowT — PiterPass — at the moment is not available.
The project Russia CityPass offers almost the same set of services for the same money. Moscow CityPass offers 40 museums and 3 tours, as well as 18 restaurants with a discount up to 10%. However, the card is more expensive than Moscow Pass (a card for one day costs 2200 rubles, as compared to 1990 rubles Moscow Pass, a three-day version — 4200 rubles against 3490 rubles), but it is offered for five days for 5200 rubles. St.Petersburg CityPass is only available for two days, it includes 21 museums and 5 excursions. A card price is 3000 rubles.
In the case of St. Petersburg, there is also St.PetersburgCard — the guest card of St. Petersburg, which is declared as the urban tourism program. It includes 60 museums of Saint-Petersburg and suburbs, 8 bus and boat tours, including the system of hop-on-hop-off (bus and water City Sightseeing). The card also provides discounts to some museums, tours, restaurants and cafes, services and souvenirs. In addition, it can be used for fare payment in transport, however, you must deposit additional money.
The essence of all these projects is almost the same, which allows to speak of a conditionally international standard of CityPass or CityCard. The main advantage for a tourist is an opportunity to visit most of the city's museums without paying extra payments (freepass), popular regular tours such as river cruises or bus tours with the system hop-on-hop-off. Also, a guest of the city gets additional discounts in cafes, hotels, the purchase of souvenirs and free use of public transport during the card validity.