Touristik Centrale Mainz
Direkt zum Inhalt
The Mainz Tourist Association has been around for 100 years – that makes 100 years of contemporary history including two world wars. Fresh ideas and the initiative of the city’s residents were needed at those times, and this has definitely not changed down to the present day. Money has always been tight, but the Mainz Tourist Association still survives.
How did it get started?
1902
In July of 1902, the General Assembly of the Old Town association had a debate on the topic of “how to increase tourism”, with the result that a commission was set up to create an information bureau for tourist matters. The association had not yet formally been established.
1905
The tourist association was founded on the basis of the Old Town association. The official founding date was when the commission was set up to increase tourism. The Association’s mission remains valid today; fortunately, it was made very far-reaching right from the beginning: “To promote tourism and cultural life in Mainz and its area of influence”.
Since 1824, Rhine steamboats have been bringing visitors to Golden Mainz, and 16 years later they began to arrive on the train as well. The train station, built around 1884, was quickly followed by a few hotels; there were already plenty of taverns around.
1908
The Tourist Association published its first tourist guide.
1913
In this year, the city’s first congress newsletter addressed the conference & meeting market. The importance of tourism and the associated economic strength quickly became apparent.
1927
The first general manager of the association was chosen. The era of Dr. Robert Schmidt began. Along with a number of city and hotel guides, he was the person who invented the Mainz wine market.
1932
The first Mainz wine market took place in the Mainzer Stadthalle (municipal centre), which, by the way, had a larger capacity than today’s Rheingoldhalle. Dr. Robert Schmidt was praised for his innovative ideas and for the economic success.
1939
The end came quickly. The wine market was cancelled. The initial outlays invested caused financial chaos for the tourist association. The association’s offices were forced to move. The city saved the association and made a store-front available to it in the Seilergasse.
After the war, Jean Baptist Alisky managed to resuscitate the wine market with 100,000 litres of wine released by the French military government. With the earnings, the tourist information office was able to be brought back to life.
1949
Alisky got the Rosenmontag parade started again. Together with the carnival corporations he formed the Great Mainz Carnival Committee. Since 1950, the Mainz Rosenmontag parade has been held annually without interruption.
1955
The close link between the association’s managing director and the maintenance of customs in Mainz is virtually part of the job.
Robert Schmidt, managing director again since 1955, founded the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Mainzer Straßencarneval (association of Mainz street carnival). This represented the beginning of the Children’s Costume Parade and the Dance on the Lu.
1962
The 2,000 year celebration of the City of Mainz was organised. The association’s subsidy was doubled (to DEM 60,000) – an investment that paid off. In the newspapers of the day, one can read reports of the many thousands of people who marvelled at the parade of historical ships on the Rhine.
1963
The Association did a special service for the German Wine Growing congress and organised 20,000 overnight stays. Even today, this would represent a major effort.
1965
Dr. Robert Schmidt was retired by Lord Mayor Jockel Fuchs. Assistant Managing Director Hans Baumann assumed the directorship of the association. This in fact led to a tradition that is still observed today: the assistant director succeeds the director.
In the very first year of his term of office, the wine market had to move to the premises of the Volkspark because of the construction of the Rheingoldhalle. In the era of Hans Baumann, many souvenirs were created and a number of calendars came on the market. The Mainz castle tours were enjoyed by numerous residents of Mainz. Today, the tours are carried out under the motto “art, culture and joie de vivre”.
1968
Karl Delorme and Hans Baumann came up with a new idea to bring joy to the people of Mainz and visitors to the city. Between Carnival and the end of August, there just had to be another reason to celebrate – Johannes Night was born. The same year, Hans Baumann was named Director of Tourism.
1971
The association moved to Bahnhofsplatz 2.
430 m² of office space were available for 12 employees and 4 trainees. The most modern technology was installed as well.
1977
The Tourist Association celebrated its 75th birthday. A total of 25,000 tulips were planted, 75 trees were planted in Nachstrasse and a large exhibition takes place in the Blütenhaus (blossom house).
1983
Another milestone in the lively history of the association involved the purchase of the Hotel Pfeil-Continental this year and the transfer of the Association’s bureaus to this building. All of a sudden, the tourism experts had also become hotel operators!
1984
The wine market changed its appearance once again. The city park with its magnificent ambience became the new refuge for wine-tasting visitors. A second highlight was the addition of the artisan’s market. The same year, the hotel owners made an advance of their own. The joined together to form a trade association in order to achieve synergistic potential for the Mainz advertising activities.
1987
The Association purchased its first PCs. Since then, improvements have been made in the IT domain in order to keep everything up to date. In May of this year, notary Dr. Friedhelm Bauer replaced Hermann Schmidt as the chairman of the Association.
1990
Hans Baumann went into well-earned retirement; his assistant Gerhard Zwick took over. In the same year, the first electronic reservation system was purchased.
1995
‘Creating synergies’ was the motto of the 90s as it still is today. Richard Pazke, the head of the city’s economic development committee, called together all those involved in the city’s tourism industry and recommended that they bundle advertising funds of the individual institutions. Mainz Marketing was born.
The founding members are the Hotel Advertising Association, the Mainz Congress Centre, the Office for Public Affairs and the tourist association. Additional sponsors that have joined since then are: the property management company of the city of Mainz, MVG, PMG, MAG, as well as the Phönix Halle (phoenix hall). The goal of Mainz Marketing is to increase the budget to € 500,000 annually.
1996
This year almost ended the history of the tourist association. There was a huge investment bottleneck in the Association’s hotel building. The roof, the facade and the plumbing were in a terrible state, which put the Association in a bad financial situation which eventually ended with the sale of the building and the eighth move for the staff.
1997
The association moved to the Brückenturm with mixed feelings. In the meantime, the good feelings have taken over completely. The entire IT and telephone systems were networked and every workplace was refurnished. This was a major change in terms of the Association’s presentation of itself towards the outside.
The Association represents Mainz at many international trade fairs and it was very much in need of an internationally comprehensible name. ‘Mainz’ had to be in it as well as the term ‘tourism’ – and also the association’s claim to being more than an office for distributing brochures. Within the scope of this new Mainz layout, the association acquired the name “Touristik Centrale Mainz”.
1998
The association has always intended to be a comprehensive service provider. In accordance with this goal, its areas of activity were defined as well. Together with the Congress Centre, the Tourist Association organised its first congress that year as a Professional Congress Organizer (PCO).
2000
Now we come to the year of superlatives in the association’s history: 2000 – the Gutenberg Year. An addition was built to the Gutenberg Museum, numerous congresses related to printing took place in Mainz, and Gutenberg was name Man of the Millennium by Time Magazine.
The tourist association opened a temporary office on Liebfrauen square, and 20 additional guides were trained. Managing Director Gerhard Zwick was able to report a 63% increase in the number of participants on guided tours, and for the first time, the association exceeded the magic number of 4,000 tours – 4,263 to be exact.
The hotels also recorded their best result at almost 800,000 overnight stays. That year, the association opened its long awaited branch office at the main train station.
2001
In March, Gerhard Zwick retired; he was succeeded by Jürgen Schmidt. Also that year, early ticket sales were bolstered. The electronic ticket system was installed online. In this very first year, more than 100,000 tickets were sold. A new target group was discovered: mobile home users. Planning for a central information point to cover this touristic aspect was begun.
2002
The Mainz tourist association celebrated its 100-year anniversary with a series of anniversary events. In addition to the official ceremony, high points of the year included a riverboat trip with a gala dinner to Worms for a presentation of the Nibelungen under the direction of Dieter Wedel and a viewing of the theatre play “Der fröhliche Weinberg“ (the happy vineyard) in the courtyard of the palace of the prince electors.
2004
The Mainz Tourist Office installed its own hotel reservation system, developed by the firm Info-Konig.
Mai 2005
The City of Mainz hosted the Germany Travel Mart (GTM). This event, the most important one for the German incoming tourist market took place for the second time since 2000 in the Gutenberg city of Mainz. Mainz Marketing sent out invitations to a party evening in the new underground garage on the banks of the Rhine. This was an event that convinced the staunchest doubters and became an unforgettable evening.
2005
The Rheinland Palatine city forum with its members Speyer, Worms, Trier, Coblenz, Kaiserslautern and Mainz, acquired a new marketing name. In future, these cities were to be known internationally as ‘Roman Cities’. In the focus of attention here are visitors from Italy, England, Sweden and Ireland who come into the Frankfurt-Hahn airport.
Carnival 2006
For the 150th anniversary of the Mainz Kleppergarde carnival dance team, the Children’s Costume Parade was ruled again by a child prince and princess for the first time since 1957: Anna-Sophie I from the House of Pabst and Prince Oliver I from the House of Wiesmann.
2006
The Info-König company developed an online visitors booking portal for the Mainz Tourist Office. As a result of its success, this system was also able to be sold to other tourist information offices in Germany.
Carnival 2007
The Arbeitsgemeinschaft Mainzer Straßencarneval (AMS) celebrated its 50th anniversary. An exhibition organised by AMS founding member Paul Delnef and the first Youth Prince of Mainz, Alban Schalk, documented the development and history of the AMS. On this occasion, the parade was held under the following motto:
“We are celebrating, reason enough,
fifty years of the Children’s Costume Parade.
Greetings from the celebrating children
of Mainz, who are proud to be here. A
day like this we will never forget –
that is surely a reason to celebrate!”
Prince Dennis I from the House of Schmidt, the son of the current managing director of the Tourist Association, became the child prince.
August 2007
The Mainz Wine Market took place for the 75th time in the Volkspark.
At the same time, this is also the last time that this event could be held in this venue. A new plan for the Volkspark specifies that relaxation should again be moved into the focus of attention and that the event venue will no longer be available. Hence, the wine market would only take place in the Stadtpark and the Rosengarten starting in 2008.
October 2007
The City of Mainz was included in the renowned national marketing association called the “Historical Highlights of Germany”. This was a major step for the national and international status of the city and its worldwide marketing efforts.
January 2008
Mainz is the host for the XVth European Guggemusikfestival and Euro Carnival in Mainz. More than 1,000 musicians from five countries made the city shake for two days. The culminating event was a huge concert with all 35 participating groups on Gutenberg Square, with 10,000 people in attendance.
August 2008
For the first time since it moved to the Stadt- und Volkspark, the Mainz Wine Market took place without a fair. So for the first time, the wine market takes the form of a conventional wine festival. A new plan is worked out to integrate the faithful exhibitors that have contributed to the wine market for decades, into the Stadtpark. The plan was successful and was met with a positive response from the exhibitors and the public at large.