Spain's tourism to go slow, but will it in Mallorca?

That he most certainly did. The artist put together a design based on a 1967 work and the lettering he had created for the logo for the 1982 World Cup, which had been held in Spain. The Sol de Miró (Miró's Sun) was the result, a gift from Miró, as he didn't want paying. One of the most famous of all tourism promotional efforts, the slogan was 'Everything Under The Sun'. Vasallo has explained the message: "Diversity under the sun, although the sun was what attracted tourists. We also needed a logo, something that no country had at that time."

The Sol de Miró campaign was highly innovative for its era and confirmed Spain's status as one of the world's leading tourism destinations and one of the more advanced in its thinking. It was used until 1992, when a new campaign with the slogan 'Passion For Life' was introduced. Down the years there have been various others, the most recent of which - 'You Deserve Spain' - was directly influenced by the pandemic.

Last week, the marketing director of Turespaña, Enrique Ruiz, said that this campaign, launched in 2022, carried a very clear message: "You deserve the best holidays in the world, and they are in Spain." With a record 93.8 million tourists having visited Spain in 2024, the campaign certainly hasn't caused any harm, unless one is of the view that heading towards 100 million a year is evidence of overtourism.

Concerns about overtourism don't necessarily appear to be foremost in the new campaign, which will officially launch on June 4 this year. But sustainability is to the fore, as was emphasised at a conference to mark Turespaña's 40th anniversary. The Mallorcan who is Spain's secretary-of-state for tourism, Rosario Sánchez, observed: "The Spain brand has had an unprecedented impact on the country, but the context has changed. There is a great deal of debate about the social and environmental impacts of tourism. It should no longer be our oil, but our renewable energy."

The current director-general, Miguel Sanz, said: "Sustainability is an increasingly important element. The campaign represents a Copernican 180-degree turn." It was therefore as if a Copernican heliocentrism, explicit in the Sol de Miró and in Vasallo's 1984 explanation, was being abandoned. And it is.

"For the first time," Sánchez stated, "there will be neither beaches nor large cities in the images". Traditional sun and beach is therefore out, to be replaced by slow and inland tourism. If you are unfamiliar with the concept, allow the EU-funded Interreg Europe to explain. Slow tourism is essentially to do with fostering deeper connections between travellers, local communities and the environment. There is a "deceleration" of the travel experience. At its core are sustainable practices. In keeping with this, the Turespaña campaign will use images from eleven inland regions of Spain.

Sánchez wasn't wholly correct. Back in the 1950s and 1960s there were separate promotions for inland Spain, perhaps as much as anything designed to prevent holidaymakers taking Julie Andrews and Rex Harrison rather too literally. There was sun on the plain, rather more of it in fact than rain. But we are now talking about a very different tourism scenario, one that was discussed by prominent individuals from the tourism and travel sectors at the conference. Numbered among them were chief government tourism representatives from Andalusia and the Canaries, both of which are synonymous with sun and beach but now turning their attention to slow tourism.

Where were the Balearic Islands? Apart from Sánchez, they weren't. Turespaña presumably didn't think there was anyone worth inviting to participate in the roundtable discussions, though conceivably they might have considered the tourism minister, Jaume Bauzá. Having been mayor of Montuïri was about the one qualification he had for the position, and Montuïri must surely count as being slow. It does, as the Pla de Mallorca region has already cottoned on to slow tourism.

Enrique Ruiz acknowledged that there is a bit of a risk in the repositioning of the Spain brand, but added that the campaign is designed "to build a narrative inside and outside Spain". It is a narrative relevant to the Balearics, if for no other reason than the islands are part of Spain. However, where, for example, does it leave Palma and all the 365-day-a-year promotion of recent times? In Spanish terms, Palma is a large city.

One of the discussions was 'From Everything Under The Sun to Everything But The Sun'. It is the sun that has sold Mallorca. Is this about to change? Somehow I suspect it won't.