What the Tasmanian Liberals will do:

Protect, promote and project Tasmania’s quality brand to the world.

It is time we got serious about branding Tasmania.

Tasmania has an enviable lifestyle; a precious, unique natural environment; unrivalled tourism potential; natural fauna and flora; exquisite food and wine and natural produce.

We also have an innovative and enterprising workforce.

Our ICT and cultural sectors illustrate that our geographic isolation is no disadvantage to living or working here, and modern communications has added to the attractiveness of major entrepreneurs being based here.

We need a committed approach to protecting and enhancing the quality Tasmanian Brand, and promoting it to the world.

What we will do
A Hodgman Liberal Government will establish a Tasmanian Brand Commissioner to drive this top priority policy.

The Brand Commissioner will have the responsibility of developing, in close collaboration with industry stakeholders and government, a powerful, authentic Tasmanian Brand to identify and differentiate Tasmanian products, services and the State in the national and international marketplace.

The Commissioner will recruit staff with expertise in branding, marketing, labelling and Trade Practices law.

He or she will be supported by an advisory panel with appropriate government, industry and stakeholder representation, including the TFGA, tourism industry council, the ICT sector, wine-makers, seafood industry, the University of Tasmania, and business representatives.

The Tasmanian Brand Commissioner will report directly to the Premier.

The Brand Commissioner, the staff and the advisory panel will be in place within six months of the election of a Hodgman Liberal Government.

The Brand Commissioner will have significant resources to develop a powerful, authentic Tasmanian Brand to identify and differentiate Tasmanian products, services and the State in the marketplace.

The Brand Commissioner will also implement aggressive and effective regional, national and international branding and marketing campaigns for the Tasmanian Brand.

The Commissioner will develop a program to provide strict accountability and ensure that all products and services carrying the Tasmanian Brand fulfil the promises they will make in regard to quality, innovation, safety and sustainability.

We will ensure Tasmania’s Brand becomes highly sought after and valuable. Products and services carrying the Tasmanian Brand will be synonymous with values such as the highest quality, innovation, safety and sustainability and, as such, will command a premium in the marketplace.

We will apply this Brand to eligible products and services, and our State, and market it aggressively around the world.  And we will jealously protect this Brand to ensure its integrity and reputation is never undermined.

Our branding strategy will help positively define Tasmanian products, services – and the State.

This will also help transform our image and make Tasmania a much more attractive place for young families and innovative people to move to, invest in, and visit.

We will head-hunt an internationally renowned Brand Manager to be Tasmania’s Brand Commissioner.

We want an outstanding Brand Manager with a proven record of corporate sector success to create the sort of Brand identity for our State and its quality products and services that many famous world companies have shown can be achieved.

The Brand Commissioner will also develop labelling strategies to underpin the Tasmanian brand – including the use of smart labelling to reinforce the integrity and quality of their product to the increasingly discerning national and international consumer; and to address labelling concerns in certain sectors such as the beef industry.

He or she will develop strict protocols and strategies for protecting the Tasmanian Brand.  Where legislation is required to better protect our Brand at a State level, a Hodgman Liberal Government will implement that, and we will also seek to ensure that, at a Federal level, laws are in place to appropriately protect brand integrity.

The Tasmanian Brand Commissioner will not engage in government self-promotion, which is what Labor has focussed on for the past 11 years.

The Tasmanian Liberals will support developing, marketing and protecting our State’s brand by providing the Tasmanian Brand Commissioner with initial funding of $6.5 million over four years.  It is our intention that the Brand Council will be incorporated into the new entity, as will the activities of the Brand Tasmania project in the Department of Economic Development.

The Tasmanian Brand Commissioner’s activities will complement and augment tourism destination branding strategies that will remain under the auspices of Tourism Tasmania.

As the Tasmanian Brand will become highly desirable, we expect the Commissioner’s work will also generate significant private sector revenue to supplement the public funding. By adding value to Tasmanian products and services carrying the Brand, this strategy will significantly boost the Tasmanian economy, creating jobs and investment across many industry sectors, lifting the profile of our State around the world, and giving all Tasmanians a renewed sense of pride.

Why this policy is needed
Tasmania is a producer of some of the finest quality products and services in the world.

We have a world-class food industry yet, according to a major review conducted in 2007, Tasmania needs to significantly raise our profile as a producer of fine foods or as a destination for culinary tourism experiences.  As the recent decision to close the McCain factory on the North West Coast showed, too many Tasmanian primary producers are at the mercy of multi-national companies rather than being recognized as producers of premium quality products.

There are significant issues related to the branding of our quality beef products that have to be addressed.

Our Genetically Modified Organism-free status has not been capitalized on, nor the fact that no Tasmanian beef producer uses Hormone Growth Promotants.

We have a major opportunity to promote Brand values, for example the benefits for overseas students to live and study here, which has not been adequately capitalized upon.

Mechanisms to protect brand integrity are currently inadequate – too often we see cases of non-Tasmanian products being misleadingly labelled as ‘Tasmanian’.

Major companies invest millions to establish successful brand identities that consumers associate with values such as quality, trust, respect and integrity. These companies employ highly skilled and professional brand managers and they invest intellectually and financially in the development of that brand. They also protect that brand fiercely to ensure its integrity is not undermined.

Successful branding offers the potential to reposition our products and services in the marketplace so they attract premiums, rather than our producers being continually at the mercy of multi-national companies – such as our vegetable producers or dairy farmers.

And an annual 1% increase in Tasmanian food and beverage sales alone would generate an estimated $33 million a year. (McKinna et al, Place of Origin Branding Report)

Tasmania’s primary producers, our food and beverage processors, our resource and manufacturing sectors, hospitality and tourism industries, ICT sector, our developing boutique service industries – and our broader economy, have an enormous amount to gain from the development, promotion and protection of a strong and unified commercial Tasmanian brand that is synonymous with values such as the highest quality, innovation, safety and sustainability.

We need to have a single, professional, and properly-resourced focus on projecting, enhancing and protecting the Tasmanian brand.

After 11 years of Labor
It is beyond doubt that Tasmania’s image has been tarnished after 11 years of Labor scandal and incompetence.

The State’s branding strategies have been ad hoc, amateurish, ineffective and hijacked by wasteful Labor government self-interest; while the State’s peak branding body, the Tasmanian Brand Council has been grossly underfunded on just $300,000 a year and with one full-time staff member.

A classic example of the failure and wasted opportunity we have seen under Labor was its much-vaunted Tasmanian Brand Project, announced in the 2008/09 Budget, that spent $1.3 million on a Brand Tasmania campaign, including advertisements and an interactive bus – that were aborted before they were launched and never saw the light of day.

A separate $4 million vegetable marketing strategy that was designed to put the industry on a more sustainable footing has also delivered questionable outcomes, especially in light of the McCain closure at Smithton.  This has again only served to highlight the need for world-class brand management for Tasmania.

These are just a few examples of more than a decade of opportunity being wasted by Labor when it comes to branding Tasmania.

Note: This funding is for the Commissioner, staff and administrative support, and to provide initial funding for protecting and promoting the Tasmanian Brand.