Gloria Lorée is Senior Vice-President, Marketing Strategy and Chief Marketing Officer at Destination Canada, Canada’s national tourism organization. Destination Canada’s Tourism 2030 : A World of Opportunity strategy, aims to position Canada among the world’s top seven tourism destinations for competitiveness and grow annual tourism revenue to $160 billion by 2030, while creating lasting prosperity for communities across the country.
Nominated by a peer for our Who’s Who of place brand leaders, Gloria has played a key role in bringing Canada’s new brand campaign Canada, naturally to life, and aligning Destination Canada’s marketing with its broader shift from a volume-based view of tourism to values-based.
Gloria, from where you sit, what has changed most in how destinations need to position themselves over the past few years, and what is driving it?
People are following their passions rather than ticking off lists of places. So the biggest shift is that destinations can no longer compete on attractions alone. Travellers are looking for experiences that align with their values, interests and aspirations, which means destinations must stand for something meaningful and distinctive. Destination Canada’s focus on what we call Highly Engaged Guests reflects this: travellers who are deeply motivated, values-aligned and looking for richer connections with people and places.
Today’s travellers are seeking authenticity, cultural connection, wellbeing, the outdoors and opportunities to engage more deeply with local communities. As a result, destination positioning has moved beyond promoting sights and activities to telling a deeper story about identity, values and purpose.
Sustainability has also become a much bigger consideration. Travellers increasingly want to know that the places they visit are protecting their natural and cultural assets and that tourism benefits local communities. Destinations need to show not only why they are worth visiting, but how tourism contributes to the wellbeing of residents and how the destination can thrive over the long term.
Technology is the other big change. Travellers increasingly rely on AI-powered tools to research, compare and plan trips, compressing what used to be a lengthy planning process into a single conversation or prompt. Destinations need to think differently about discoverability, content and visibility in AI-driven environments. AI is also raising expectations around personalisation, and the opportunity is to use data and intelligence to understand travellers more deeply and create more relevant experiences before, during and after their trip.
To sum it up: destination positioning has evolved from promoting places to expressing purpose. The destinations that will stand out are those that know who they are, understand what travellers value, and can deliver trusted content and experiences that create value for both visitors and residents.
A World of Opportunity is framed as a shift in how tourism is experienced, promoted and measured, not only a growth target. What does that shift look like in practice, and what has been hardest about it?
At its core, Tourism 2030 is about moving from a volume-based view of tourism to a values-based one. Success is no longer defined solely by visitor numbers, hotel occupancy or spending. It is about ensuring tourism generates wealth and wellbeing for Canadians, enriches the lives of visitors and creates positive outcomes for the communities that host them.
In practice, that means rethinking how we develop destinations, how we attract travellers and investment, and therefore how we measure success. We are focusing on visitors who align with our values and who engage more deeply with communities, culture and local businesses. It also means thinking about tourism not just as an economic sector, but as a contributor to quality of life, cultural vitality, environmental stewardship and community prosperity.
One of the most visible examples is Tourism’s Wealth & Wellbeing Index, launced recently by Destination Canada. Traditionally, tourism has been measured through visitor spending, arrivals and occupancy. The Index expands that lens to six dimensions: Economy, Employment, Enablement, Environment, Engagement and Experience. It helps us understand not only what tourism generates economically, but how it supports communities, preserves culture, strengthens infrastructure, protects natural assets and enriches the lives of residents and visitors alike.
The shift is also reflected in how we promote Canada. Rather than simply encouraging more travel, we focus on tourism that is sustainable, regenerative and beneficial over the long term: dispersing travel across seasons and regions, supporting community-led destination development, and making sure growth enhances rather than diminishes what makes places special in the first place.
The hardest part has been measurement itself. Counting visitors or spending is relatively straightforward. Measuring community wellbeing, cultural impact or environmental outcomes is much more complex. Thankfully, the Index gives us a practical framework and a proven methodology to go beyond traditional metrics, so we can make better decisions and build a stronger sector for the long term.
For me, one of the most important shifts is that we are no longer only asking how much tourism we are generating. We are also asking what kind of tourism we are generating, who benefits from it, and how it contributes to the places people call home.
We are no longer only asking how much tourism we are generating. We are also asking what kind of tourism, who benefits from it, and how it contributes to the places people call home.
Brand Leadership is one of the four drivers in the strategy. How do you think about the relationship between destination marketing and the broader positioning of Canada as a place, beyond tourism?
I see them as deeply interconnected. At its core, Brand Leadership is about building preference for Canada and turning global interest into high-value leisure travel and business events demand. But the impact extends beyond tourism. Tourism is often the first way people experience a country, and the impressions they form shape how they see Canada as a place to visit, study, invest, do business and build a life.
We also know that reputation has a direct link to performance. Canada ranks second, behind Japan, in the RepCore Nations ranking, and that is not just a nice recognition; it is an economic asset. RepCore’s research associates a one-point increase in a country’s reputation with a 7.2% increase in tourism revenue and a 1% increase in foreign direct investment. That is why we view Brand Leadership as an investment in economic competitiveness, not simply a marketing activity. When we build on Canada’s reputation for trust, openness, authenticity and quality, we create the conditions for more visitation, business events, investment and growth.
Canada, naturally. is one example of how we have grounded our marketing in who we are as a place. It is rooted in authenticity, reflecting not just our landscapes but our people, values, cultures and way of life. Rather than creating a marketing construct, we are building from what is genuinely Canadian. That matters because our Highly Engaged Guests are less interested in checklist tourism and more interested in understanding what makes a place distinct. Authenticity is not just a branding choice for us; it is a competitive advantage.
Canada, naturally. takes a deliberately understated, everyday-moments approach at a time when many destination campaigns compete on spectacle. What was the thinking behind that choice, and what were you willing to give up to make it work?
The starting point was a simple insight: in a world saturated with the fake and the filtered, authenticity has become increasingly valuable. Many destinations compete with dramatic scenery, bucket-list attractions and highly polished imagery. Canada certainly has those assets, but we felt our strongest differentiator was not just what Canada looks like, but how Canada feels.
The more authentically we tell Canada’s story, the more we attract travellers who share those values, and the more we strengthen Canada’s reputation. Our Highly Engaged Guests are 65% more likely than other travellers to choose destinations that feel unique and authentic. They want to connect with people, local culture, nature and communities in a way that feels real, and that insight became a guiding principle for the brand.
So the campaign deliberately moves away from presenting Canada as a collection of attractions and instead positions it as a place: awe-inspiring landscapes, but also warm-hearted people and extraordinary experiences even in the most ordinary encounters. The creative focuses on human moments, local interactions, culture and a sense of openness and belonging. The goal is to help travellers imagine themselves in Canada rather than admire it from a distance. The most enduring brands are built on truths rather than slogans, so authenticity has become our creative strategy.
One example of how we brought this to life is OpenHome, our campaign with OpenTable, which invited Americans to dine in Canadian homes. It grew from the insight that feeling welcome had become a leading driver of destination choice. Instead of telling travellers that Canadians are welcoming, we let them experience that warmth first-hand. Putting Canadians themselves at the centre of the story gave the campaign cultural relevance well beyond traditional tourism marketing.
What did we give up? Some of the immediate attention that spectacle can generate. Big, dramatic imagery is very effective at driving awareness, but awareness alone is not our objective. We even used Google Street View imagery in parts of the campaign, because it showed Canada as people actually experience it rather than through a curated tourism lens. We also gave up the desire to be everything to everyone. By grounding the brand in authenticity, we are intentionally appealing to travellers who value what Canada genuinely excels at, and that builds a stronger, more differentiated position in a crowded market.
The most enduring brands are not built on slogans but on truths, so authenticity has become our creative strategy.
Collective action and convening the sector run right through the strategy. In practice, what makes that kind of coordination work across so many partners and jurisdictions, and where does it tend to get stuck?
The Sector Advancement driver of our strategy is about strengthening the conditions for growth. It positions tourism within Canada’s broader economic and trade agenda and helps make sure the sector has the competitiveness, investment, partnerships and enabling conditions it needs over the long term.
We have a national perspective and the ability to bring together provinces, territories, destination organisations, industry partners and governments around a shared vision. One of the most important things we can do is create the conditions for collaboration: a common strategy, shared intelligence and a forum for collective action. We have seen repeatedly that Canada’s influence is amplified when we take a Team Canada approach. It lets us punch above our weight internationally and offer a stronger value proposition.
Where things may sometimes get stuck is usually implementation rather than alignment. Different jurisdictions work on different timelines, have different funding realities and face different local pressures. Keeping momentum requires patience, trust and a willingness to focus on long-term collective outcomes alongside immediate local needs. What makes it work is a shared belief that tourism can play a much larger role in advancing Canada’s economic priorities, diversifying growth and creating lasting prosperity for communities across the country.
Improving Canada’s competitiveness rankings was part of the backdrop to the strategy. How do you balance an honest reading of where Canada stands with the optimism a national brand has to project?
Improving Canada’s competitiveness was one of the ambitions that shaped the strategy. Our goal is to rank among the seven most competitive destinations in the world in the World Economic Forum’s Travel & Tourism Development Index by 2030.
The key is being realistic about the challenges while remaining confident in Canada’s strengths. We are optimistic not because we ignore gaps, but because we have a plan to address them and a strong foundation to build on. Through extensive consultation with partners across the country, we identified seven levers that need to work together: revenue and yield growth, brand leadership, investment, access, workforce productivity and digital readiness, sustainability, and public and policy support. None of these is a challenge any one organisation must solve alone; through the Team Canada approach, partnerships and industry task forces, we are working on each of them together.
At the same time, the momentum is real. Canadian tourism is no longer a recovery story; it is a growth story. Our latest Tourism Outlook shows the sector on track to exceed our $160 billion annual revenue target by 2028, two years earlier than projected, and to reach nearly $178 billion by 2030. Tourism is projected to grow faster than the broader economy, it is already one of Canada’s largest service exports, and it is projected to contribute 9 to 10% towards Canada’s export diversification goal by 2035. The opportunity now is to accelerate in the areas where Canada has the greatest potential to compete.
Looking to 2030 and beyond, what are the priorities you are most focused on, and what would tell you the positioning work is genuinely landing?
We are focused on the areas where tourism can contribute most to Canada’s broader priorities: economic diversification, investment attraction, innovation and long-term competitiveness. Tourism is both an economic driver and an export industry that brings international spending directly into communities across the country.
Market diversification is a major opportunity. Canada has set an ambitious goal of growing non-U.S. exports, and we already see strong long-term growth potential from overseas markets. Building demand from a broader range of international markets will strengthen resilience and create new opportunities for communities.
Investment attraction is another critical priority. To capture future demand, Canada needs the experiences, infrastructure and destination readiness to support it, which is why we are increasingly focused on creating investable opportunities and strengthening tourism supply in ways that benefit visitors and residents alike.
And AI is rapidly reshaping how travellers discover, evaluate and purchase travel. We want Canada to lead, not follow, in that transformation. Through initiatives such as the Canadian Tourism Data Collective and our wider focus on digital readiness, we are helping the sector adapt and compete. When demand, investment and innovation work together, their impact compounds, and that is where some of the biggest opportunities lie, for tourism and for Canada’s economy as a whole.
In terms of brand positioning, success goes beyond awareness. We want Canada increasingly associated with authenticity, meaningful experiences and genuine human connection. With more than half of our target guests actively seeking authentic experiences, there is already strong alignment between traveller demand and Canada’s positioning. Ultimately, we will know the work is landing when people around the world do not just think of Canada as a place they would like to visit, but as a place they feel connected to.
Thank you, Gloria.
Learn more about Destination Canada and its Canada, naturally. brand story.
For more perspectives from practitioners and thinkers shaping the future of place branding, explore our Place Brand Leaders interviews.
