Don’t Trump Slovenia

[Glasses await a wine-tasting event in Slovenia’s vineyard region.
All photos by Jonathan Tourtellot]

Try this: Google the words “Melania tourism.” Now watch your computer screen fill up with reports on how some Slovenians hope to cash in on their new renown as the birthplace of the U.S. First Lady, especially around her small hometown of Sevnica.

Be afraid, Slovenia, be very afraid.

For me, this is a stomach-clencher. Over my career I have become sadly used to revisiting destinations I remembered fondly from some previous decade, only to find them spoiled to varying degrees by irresponsible tourism development.

What a joy it was then to revisit Slovenia last year after a 10-year interval. It was even better than before—and before had been pretty good. The capital, Ljubljana, had expanded its already charming traffic-free core, the food and wine selections had grown, the citizenry was affable, tourism was not yet out of control, and environmentally friendly policies were in place seemingly everywhere. Conveniently for monolingual me, English was spoken widely.

Recycling bins and bicycles typify Ljubljana's green policies.

Recycling bins and bicycles typify Ljubljana’s green policies.

Outside the capital, the area around impossibly beautiful Lake Bled was imposing its own tourism traffic controls, and assorted sustainability practices were underway in the gorgeous Julian Alps. Recycling and bicycling were strongly encouraged even in the modern city of Nova Gorica, Slovenia’s nod to mass casino tourism for numerically challenged Italians from across the border. More than a dozen municipalities around the small country have signed into the Slovenia Green plan.

And now, Trump looms.

No not Melania. She seems an amiable sort, perhaps with questionable taste in choosing a husband and by extension his taste in resort development and his need for gold-plated seat-belt buckles on his plane. (True. Google it.) No, it’s the shadow of Donald himself.

He may choose to pay a state visit at some point! That’s what worries me. Be afraid. Not so much the impact on Slovenia of Trump the president, but of Trump the developer.

Long before Trump was a force in politics, I would counsel destination tourism planners: “Look at whatever Donald Trump is doing, and do the opposite.” Trump-style development has typically ignored local culture, environment, history, ecology, and destination economic benefit (while loudly proclaiming otherwise), and instead celebrated a fixation not on destination character, but on self-indulgent luxury and, of course, the Trump brand. His zero-sum, you-lose-I-win approach to deal-making flies in the face of the symbiotic relationship that sustainable tourism should have with its surrounding communities.

In short, Trump is the antithesis of everything that has made Slovenia such a success as a genuine, well-cared-for destination. Not long after my first visit, National Geographic’s former chairman of the board, Gil Grosvenor, cornered me and said he wanted an idea for a European vacation—“Europe the way it used to be.” Charming. Was there any place left like that? “Have you ever been to Slovenia?” I asked. No, he hadn’t. He went. He liked it.

Tourists disembark at a Slovenia railway station.

Tourists disembark at a Slovenia railway station.

Well, I like it, too. And the idea of Trump appearing and spewing his notions of tourism success across this pleasant land? I can only hope Slovenia’s wiser heads prevail.

Rather than Trump swaying Slovenia, could Slovenia sway Trump? Of course not; Trump is apparently unswayable. But Slovenia would lose few points in the eyes of the world by launching a tourism information campaign on the theme, “We’re better than that.”

Rather than boasting about increased U.S. arrivals coming for a trivial reason, I would hope Slovenians would work to send those Americans home with a deeper appreciation for Slovenian values. Melania’s town of Sevnica should join the Slovenia Green program. (They say they will!). Boast about that, instead. Let the Trump notoriety become a tourism teaching opportunity. Let people see how to put charm, health, and authenticity into the travel experience. Let every visitor leave with a deeper appreciation for the sophistication of this small country.

Is it sophisticated enough to survive some future Trump visit? I’m betting so. Melania herself, they say, speaks five languages. Now that’s very Slovenian.

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Multilingual brochures welcome visitors to Slovenia's Soca Valley.

Multilingual brochures welcome visitors to Slovenia’s Soca Valley.

Casinos: A Bad Bet

Atlantic City’s recent woes provide a lesson for any destination hoping to find gold in the glitter of casino development. By last month, four of the New Jersey beach city’s 12 casinos were closed, with two more reportedly teetering. Some 8,000 people are now out of work.

What happened?

The key point: Casinos are a manufactured tourist attraction. Usually, their architecture, decor, and guest experience have nothing to do with their geographical location—no inherent link to the character of the destination. (Indeed, they often try to evoke some other place, theme-park style. For some reason, Italy seems to rank high in providing such fake ambiance, from Caesar to the Renaissance to Venice.)

Without sense-of-place as a unique selling point, any destination dependent on casinos is vulnerable to new competitors in more convenient, cheaper locations.

That’s what happened to Atlantic City.

The resort city had been on the decline in the early 1970s. By then, it was known mainly for its street names featured on the Monopoly game board and the Miss America beauty pageant, itself a franchise of shrinking prominence. Introduced in 1976, casinos were to be the city’s salvation.

For nearly a generation, they were. Atlantic City was monopoly come true: the only legal gambling destination east of the Mississippi.

But laws changed, and new casinos sprouted in neighboring states and on Indian reservations. Adding to all this new competition, the strain of the 2008 financial collapse signaled the beginning of the end for the tiring gambling mecca. During the years of casino success, the city had failed to develop its character in other ways, to make itself inherently an interesting, attractive place to visit and live. It depended on the monoculture of gaming, a fatal error.

Even at their height, Atlantic City casinos attracted a large proportion of day trippers, people who rode in on buses from Philadelphia, Baltimore, or New York just for a few hours of gambling. They didn’t buy hotel rooms, dinners, breakfasts, or much of anything else. Many didn’t even go to the beach. The economic juice came almost solely from staffing and supplying casinos.

Casinos tend to be generic, hardly ever reflective of the locale. They do not attract tourists interested in the place; they attract people who want to gamble. Given the relentlessly increasing demand for beach tourism, there are few seaside cities that really need casinos for economic success. What’s more, the casino scene may deter more desirable overnight tourists who are looking for a less glitz and more focus on the pleasures of he shore.

Atlantic City shows that casino success may be fleeting. Long term, casinos are a bad bet for places that have their own inherent and distinctive attractions such as scenery, nature, and history.

Such destinations would be wise not to go “all in.”