Foodspotters Descend On Ireland
Wednesday, 30th November 2011
Waterford on the menu for 450,000 US Foodies
Two of the world's top food bloggers arrived in Ireland last week to see and taste all that is good about food in Ireland. Christopher Connolly's and Amy Cao's, from US based food blogging site Foodspotting.com, visit to Waterford includes an overnight at the Cliffhouse Hotel in Ardmore and a visit to Waterford Crystal, as part of their week long culinary food expedition. During their trip, the duo will be blogging to their 450,000 followers and showing them all that Ireland has to offer food enthusiasts.
Failte Ireland's Head of Operations for the South East, Gary Breen emphasised "Foodspotting.com is the perfect platform to promote the food of the South East and this country as an important destination for the best dishes and beverages. Ireland has some of the best quality ingredients as well as its own unique cuisine and this partnership allows us to get that message across to the people who count in the US.
"Having the Foodspotting team here in Waterford and blogging about Irish food and their experiences will go a long way in helping to ramping up Irish tourism's presence online and through social media. In this day and age, if you are not online, you are nowhere and opportunities such as this are vital."
'Foodspotting.com is a highly regarded US based food blogging site that sets out to make it easy to find and share favorite foods using its website and mobile apps. Instead of simply reviewing restaurants, users can recommend their favorite dishes using photos as well as seeing what others have recommended during their travels. Launched in January 2010, Foodspotting.com now has over 450,000 users-ranging from those who just love food to experts from the Travel Channel and Zagat. It was named as one of Time Magazine's 50 Best Websites of 2010.
Food is a central part of any visitor's stay in Ireland. Current research shows that approximately 2 out of every 5 spent by tourists in Ireland is spent on buying food and drink. In 2009, close to 2 billion was spent by visitors on food and drink with overseas visitors accounting for 60% of this figure.
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