Weather Forecasts Impact Devon Tourism
With Woolacombe only a short drive away from Exeter, this makes one of the UK’s best beaches easily accessible for those living in Devon’s capital city. However, with the UK weather typically being temperamental this can lead to hesitation from families when it comes to staycation commitments. Misleading forecasts can also cause Devon businesses to potentially miss out on millions of business.
Woolacombe Bay Holiday Parks were interested in finding out if the Met Office weather forecasts actually tie up with the actual rainfall in Woolacombe on the day.
The Met Office got the forecast ‘wrong’ 40% of the time
The results show that the Met Office got the forecast ‘wrong’ over 40% of the time, across the 53 days tracked. Over 40% had a forecasted 10% or higher chance of rain and on 16 of the days not a single drop fell. The conclusion was gathered following weekly benchmarks of the Met Office weather forecast for Woolacombe a week in advance and then compared this to the Woolacombe data from Weathercloud. A full breakdown of the benchmarked data can be found here.
A breakdown of the results (dated February 7th - March 31st) shows -
13.2% rain forecasted and wet weather
41.5% rain forecasted but dry weather
45.3% low or no rain forecasted and dry weather
Interestingly, when the rain did fall it happened to be in the evenings or just for an hour or two, making a high percentage of the day dry. Should the Met Office update their messaging?
Met Office forecasts can be misleading
The way Met Office forecasts are presented could be seen as misleading to tourists, causing Devon businesses to potentially lose out on £100,000’s of business yearly. With tourism being worth £1.6 billion a year supporting over 50,000 jobs, it shows the power weather forecasting has on tourist decision making.
Maybe the Met Office should decide to update their messaging, for example showcasing when in the day the rain is likely to fall, for example in the evening. This more accurate representation of the weather forecasts will allow tourists to make a more informed decision. This could be make or break for those only travelling up for the day from local areas like Exeter.
How does the weather forecast affect beach days?
Following these interesting findings, Woolacombe Bay Holiday Parks were then interested in seeing if the weather forecast was impacting beach days. This was done through a Facebook poll to their customers to see at what point from 10% to 100% chance of rain they would cancel a trip to the beach.
The data shows that of the 202 followers polled, 24% said they would cancel their plans at 40% chance of rain and an equal 24% said they would only cancel at 100% chance. This shows people are willing to put up with a small bit of drizzle, but this very much does depend on the type of visit you are making to the beach.
