A black-and-white tourist information guide on Santorini from half a century ago is revealing of how the emblematic Greek vulcanic island was transformed from isolated paradise to one of the world’s top tourist destinations over the course of a few decades.
Published in 1971 by Petros Delendas, the slim “Guide of Santorini” was recently rediscovered by AMNA. In its few pages, it describes a much different image of Santorini compared to the luxury travel destination that the world knows the island as today.
From 75 beds to 80,000 total capacity in 50 years
The infrastructure described by Delendas in 1971 comes in dire contrast with the bustling life on today’s island. At the time, Santorini had a mere 75 tourist bed places and there was no port, “because of the great depth of its waters to the west, and to the east, due to sedimentation.”
Despite that early emergence of tourism, the local economy continued to rely on agriculture and local produce. There was no water supply other than the annual rainfall and one single stream of natural running water by a remote chapel. “The island has neither lakes nor rivers, but when the winters are rainy there is an abundance of water,” Delendas wrote in his guide of Santorini.
55 years later, the island has gone from zero port to two ports, welcoming over one million cruise passengers annually across 750 to 800 ship calls as one of the country’s top cruise destinations alongside Piraeus and Mykonos. The government has even enforced a hard limit of 8,000 cruise passengers per day and a seasonal 20 euro sustainability tax per person to cruise arrivals in an effort to tackle overtourism during peak season.
Globally famous for its unique volcanic landscape, its special architecture and Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) products, Santorini boasts a total tourist accommodation capacity of around 80,000 beds. On such a small island, this capacity corresponds to 860 tourist beds per square kilometer, giving it one of the highest bed densities relative to land size in Greece.
The beginings of Santorini’s culinary tourism
Delendas, described by his niece Margarita Delenda-Lidorikis as a larger-than-life personality, did not only promote the island as a touristic destination, but he was also the first person to promote its local produce.
He created the first organized market for pre-packaged products of Santorini, where he presented and sold Santorini wines, fava and capers to visitors. These products would eventually become key to Santorini’s international gastronomic identity and place the island high on the list of the world’s top international culinary destinations.
“At the time, those products were completely unknown to foreign tourists, but also to many Greeks,” Delenda-Lidorikis wrote in the 2014 photo album “Santorini as seen on Postcards up to 1956.”
Santorini expands European reach with new campaigns
In recent years, the local authorities of Santorini have focused on extending its tourist season with thematic tourism initiatives.
This autumn, Santorini is further strengthening its presence in European markets by investing in targeted promotional actions and partnerships with airlines that directly connect the island with major foreign markets.
At the heart of the new campaign is France, where the Municipality of Thira is cooperating with Transavia for a wide-scale promotional action, which will be implemented during September and offer the island extra visibility to millions. The airline connects Santorini with Paris, Lyon and Nantes, with a total of 12 direct flights per week, serving, according to the Municipality of Thira, as a key aviation partner for the French market.
As part of the partnership, images of Santorini will be displayed on 205 digital screens in 11 central stations of Line 14 of the Paris Metro, which connects the city with Orly Airport – a massive promotional network with more than 4 million passengers daily in the heart of the French capital.
The campaign will also include a newsletter dedicated to Santorini sent to Transavia’s base of 10 million registered users, a banner on the company’s main website, which records approximately 2.4 million visitors per month, as well as a push notification on its app to 1.9 million users, and posts through Transavia France’s social media, according to AMNA.
The promotional plan is expandind into Switzerland, too, through a four-month joint advertising campaign with Edelweiss Air, a member of the Lufthansa Group.
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