TOURISM bosses in York are celebrating after the city scooped a prestigious European Excellence Award.

Visit York, the official tourism agency for the city, collected the prestigious award at the European Awards ceremony held on Thursday in Prague.

The communications industry awards honour the very best in European communications and York landed its prize after beating off some extremely tough competition.

This award will sit alongside the prestigious European Cities Tourism Award bestowed on the city in 2008, when York scooped the title Best European City.

Visit York was selected as a finalist out of almost 1,500 entries for its high profile public relations and marketing campaign, Unlocking York, on the run-up to the summer opening of its new visitor centre, in Museum Street.

Since it opened, 276,000 people have visited the new centre, compared with 147,500 visitors through the doors when it was based at the De Grey Rooms – a 86 per cent increase in visitor numbers.

The aim of Visit York’s campaign, in conjunction with Willoughby PR, was to increase visits to the new visitor centre by 40 per cent in its first year of operation.

A range of creative public relations tactics were utilized in the campaign, including a school art competition, an online survey to find Yorkshire’s favourite personalities and You Tube video footage featuring characters from York Theatre Royal’s production of the Wind In The Willows.

Kay Hyde, of Visit York, said: “We are thrilled to win this award which once again assists in establishing York on a European stage, showcasing the city to top communications professionals from across Europe. We were up against some very high-profile names in the communications industry, so this is quite a coup and recognition of the fantastic teamwork that goes into promoting York as a visitor destination.”