Major event highlights

We have secured and supported a number of successful events in the State, which attracted thousands of people from around the world, added significant dollars into the economy and promoted our State through media coverage. Some event highlights are below.

In February 2020, Perth hosted five Group Stage matches of the ICC Women's T20 World Cup tournament in a festival of cricket at the historic WACA Ground. Nine of the 10 international women's cricket teams were in Perth to compete including New Zealand, Sri Lanka, England, South Africa, the West Indies, Thailand, Bangladesh and defending champions, Australia.

The tournament was broadcast into some of WA's key tourism markets including the United Kingdom, India and throughout Asia. More than 5,280 cricket fans turned out for the double-header at the WACA Ground in Perth on Monday February 24, which featured Australia v Sri Lanka and India v Bangladesh and broke the record for crowd numbers for a women's cricket match in Western Australia.

To support the event, Tourism WA was actively involved in organising a 'fan walk' from the WACA to Perth Stadium in the lead-up to the first match, with around 360 people from nine different cultural groups (representing the nine international teams taking part in the competition).

A T20 trophy tour also included stops at iconic WA tourism destinations including Rottnest Island.

Bledisloe Cup

More than 61,000 fans flocked to the Bledisloe Cup match in August 2019, setting an attendance record for a sporting event at Optus Stadium.

Close to 7,400 visitors from outside WA travelled to Perth to witness the Wallabies defeat their traditional rivals, the All Blacks. The total spend by visiting rugby fans was more than $12.5 million. The game was broadcast to around 280 million people worldwide, including into WA’s key tourism markets of New Zealand, the UK and Japan.

The success of the event saw it return to Optus Stadium in September 2021 when COVID-19 restrictions were in place. WA's world-leading response to the pandemic meant locals had the privilege of seeing international sport in their home State, with the event held in front of a largely intrastate crowd of more than 52,700 people.

Broome’s Shinju Matsuri Festival is supported through Tourism WA’s Regional Events Program.  It is one of the longest-running events in WA, having celebrated its 51st anniversary in 2021. Shinju Matsuri is the Japanese name for ‘Festival of the Pearl’ and the event plays an important role in celebrating the town’s rich pearling history, multicultural community and extraordinary landscapes.

In 2021, all events on the festival's program sold-out ahead of time, with the majority of ticket sales to out-of-region visitors. About 20,000 people attended more than 50 events over the festival's two-week period, providing close to $7.5m in valuable economic impact as well as creating jobs for the Kimberley region. 

Ord Valley Muster

The East Kimberley's biggest festival, the Ord Valley Muster has been funded through Tourism WA's Regional Events Program since 2008. 

The 20^th Ord Valley Muster, held in Kununurra in May 2021, had a strong focus on Aboriginal performers and cultural experiences. The Aviair Helspirit Kimberley Moon Experience featured an entirely Aboriginal line-up, headlined by Jessica Mauboy, a Welcome to Country at all events and a high representation of Aboriginal artists at the inaugural Art in the Park event.

The 2021 festival recorded its highest-ever turnout, with 11,400 people attending over nine days. Close to 2,300 travelled to the event from outside the Kimberley region, generating thousands of visitor nights for local accommodation providers. Around $5.3 million was injected into the local economy as a result of the 2021 event, which has secured Tourism WA support through the Regional Events Program until 2023.

Boost Mobile Margaret River Pro and Rip Curl Rottnest Search

World Surf League event the Margaret River Pro, has been held in Margaret River in various forms since 1985 and supported by the State Government since 1999. The Pro is one of only two Australian events on the prestigious Championship Tour schedule which attracts the world's top professional men and women surfers.

In 2021, WA hosted two World Championship Tour surfing events in the same year, having secured the Rip Curl Rottnest Search as a one-off event held at Rottnest's Strickland Bay alongside the Boost Mobile Margaret River Pro. The two events reached a global audience of millions through online and television broadcast, further promoting WA as a world class surf-destination of choice.

Tourism WA will continue its support of the Margaret River Pro in 2022 with the WSL scheduling the event as a mid-season decider. Competition results will determine which surfers advance to the final five events of the tour and automatically qualify for the following season.

2021 Toyota AFL Grand Final

In 2021 Perth hosted its first-ever AFL Grand Final. The historic occasion was only the second time a Grand Final had been played outside of Victoria in the game's 124-year history.

Tourism WA-funded activations and marketing support ensured Perth CBD tourism and hospitality businesses benefitted from the event and that our State and city's tourism drawcards were on full display to the nation during the Grand Final long weekend.

Activities included city dressing, promotion of Grand Final accommodation packages to regional WA footy fans and support of the Toyota AFL Premiership Cup Tour, which visited a number of iconic tourism destinations throughout the State.

A social media campaign promoted Perth to interstate tourism markets, Grand Final quokka GIFs were developed for social media and AFLW star and Grand Final commentator, Abbey Holmes, created social content promoting Perth and surrounds.

A giant Sherrin football banner at Matagarup Bridge created a focal point for WA Grand Final-themed social posts from the public and Perth signage on Optus Stadium's surface promoted the city to a national average audience of 3.85 million who watched the broadcast. 

Mass participation events

We supported a number of mass participation events in 2019-20, which attracted more than 9,000 visitors from outside the State, who spent 68,325 nights in WA and added more than $16 million to the economy in visitor spend. These events were the Australian Men’s Hockey Masters, All Schools Athletic Championships, Ironman WA, Ironman 70.3 and Cape to Cape MTB. Supporting mass participation events is one of our key priorities as these events help attract thousands of competitors, officials and supporters, adding significant dollars into the economy.

In 2020-21 the events industry was heavily impacted by COVID-19 due to restrictions on mass gatherings and travel. Rather than cancelling events, our aim was to reschedule them to ensure we have a great range of events on offer when the time is right.