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Rudolph and Santa soon billion euro business

Niina Körkkö welcomes visitors from around the globe for a ride in Rudolph's sleigh.

ROVANIEMI: Niina Körkkö welcomes tourists from around the world for a ride in Rudolph’s sleigh. Winter tourism in Lapland could soon have a turnover of €1,5 billion.

Location

“That will be €100,” says booking clerk Niina Körkkö to the couple from Russia that together with their two children want the 1000 meter reindeer sleigh ride. The man cashes out the €100 without blinking. Santa Claus and Rudolf is big business in Lapland.

Some 500,000 overnights will visit Rovaniemi this year. Santa Claus’ home cavern is just north of the city, strategically placed on the Arctic Circle. A glossy Santa Park is nearest neighbor.  

“The season started earlier this year,” tells Niina. She notes that more tourists are lining up for a ride with Rudolph this winter. “Especially from Italy, Japan, England and even from Australia. Some Russians also, but the majority of Russians will come in early January when they celebrate Christmas”

CEO Timo Rautajoki in Lapland Chamber of Commerce believes tourism will grow rapidly in the years to come.

“Tourism in Lapland has a turnover of €700 million. I expect that to double to €1,5 billion by 2025,” Rautajoki said at an Arctic conference in Rovaniemi in early December. At the same conference, Finland’s Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen jokes to the audience by saying he couldn’t get an appointment with Santa Claus. “He is naturally too busy nowadays, but I could get an appointment in June next year,” smiled the Prime Minister. 

Winter tourism is, however, no joke for the Finnish economy and in particular for Lapland. The region has an unemployment rate of 12 percent, up nearly two percent since 2012. The region’s high unemployment rate is also one explanation behind the winter tourism success in Lapland according to some researchers.

Success in Finland, failure in Norway
Seija Tuulentie with the Finnish Forest Research Institute (Metla) and Arvid Viken with UiT Norway’s Arctic Univeristy have done a comparative study between to winter resorts, Muonio in Finland and Målselv in Norway. 

“Mounio has many local entrepreneurs and easier access to seasonal temporary staff, while the resort in Målselv had investors from the south and little local belonging,” Seija Tuulentie said at the Rovaniemi conference. In Norway, the unemployment rate is near to zero and salaries are the highest in Europe. Målselv resort announced bankruptcy earlier this year.

Lapland has a strong marketing internationally, and public subsidies for development of resorts and winter-tourism are stronger in Finland than in Norway, according to the researchers.

Charter planes
Charter planes from all over Europe fly in short-time visitors now in December. Some is even coming on single-day visits before flying home to cities like London or Paris. Santa Claus has been welcoming guests to his cave outside Rovaniemi since 1998.

Rovaniemi Tourism & Marketing outlines in their strategic goals how to boost the tourism flow. The goal is a doubling within a ten years period and the products will be expanded not only to focus on Santa Claus. That strategy is already very visible in Lapland; both the number of dog-sledges and snow-mobiles around resort areas like Saariselkä, Levi and Ylläs are sharply increasing.