It’s an open secret: the arrival of the Michelin Guide in a city (or in this case, a province) requires a financial investment from municipalities and other organizations, dedicated in particular to promoting the work following its publication, scheduled for 2025. How much? That’s the whole mystery.
The Alliance de l’industrie touristique du Québec (AITQ) and various partners have apparently set aside sums of money for this purpose, the exact amount of which remains confidential, declared The Press Flore Bouchon, communications and public affairs manager for the Alliance. “The agreement that the Alliance signed with Michelin is in no way to attract them to Quebec. Michelin had already decided to give Quebec gastronomy a star and their inspectors had been here for several weeks, even before the agreement was signed, which is purely aimed at promoting and marketing this new guide internationally, to make Quebec known to as many food tourism enthusiasts as possible,” explains Ms.me Bouchon, specifying that no sum had yet been paid to the French publisher, the promotional activities not having yet begun. “We understand that speculative figures are currently circulating in certain media, but our agreement with Michelin provides for a clear clause on the confidentiality of the sums planned for this partnership.”
The same story is heard at Montréal Centre-ville, a commercial development company that also contributed, although it could not reveal how much. “This money is used first and foremost for the campaign that accompanies the marketing of the Michelin Guide and not to pay for the guides themselves,” explains its general manager Glenn Castanheira. “Whether or not there are stars in our territory, which we have no guarantee of; in the analyses we have done, if we translated this investment into advertising purchases, we would have less visibility than with this agreement with Michelin.”
However, we know that Canada Economic Development contributed $450,000, an investment spread over three years. Destination Québec Cité, the Capital’s tourism promotion office, has lined up $100,000, which will be used to advertise the destination once the guide comes off the presses.
With the collaboration of Iris Gagnon-Paradis