Press releases

The public has voted Birmingham as the Best UK City at the influential Group Leisure Awards 2009.

The awards were handed out on Wednesday evening (23 September), at the Hilton Birmingham Metropole Hotel, in front of 400 guests from the travel and tourism industry.

Birmingham was one of four finalists, beating off stiff competition from Leeds, London and Manchester to scoop the top prize. The finalists are nominated by readers of Group Leisure magazine and groupleisure.com.

Accepting the award on behalf of Marketing Birmingham, Marketing Director Dave Hodgson said: “We’re delighted that Birmingham has been named Best UK City at the Group Leisure Awards. This is a particularly prestigious award as it is voted for by the public.

“It’s also great recognition for a city that continues to put leisure tourism high on its agenda with exciting new ventures in the pipeline to add to the range and quality currently on offer.

“Favourite attractions such as Cadbury World, The National Sealife Centre and Warwick Castle are using the latest technology to update their offer and continue to attract new audiences. With billions of pounds worth of new investments planned for the future, Birmingham continues to value all its visitors, whether individuals families or groups.”

It was a great night for the West Midlands with Drayton Manor winning best Children’s Attraction, Warwick Castle winning best attraction and BMIBaby winning best Airline. An incredible three out of four of the venues nominated for the Best Children’s Attraction are in the Heart of England region.

Tourism in Birmingham is going from strength to strength. During 2008 more than 32.2 million leisure and business tourists came to the city, spending a total of £4.6bn and creating 1,500 new jobs.

During the past year the city’s tourism website visitbirmingham.com has seen a 107 per cent rise in visitors using this information resource to plan their next city break.

For more information on the awards see groupleisure.com/vote.