What is CBB?
Saffron created the City Brand Barometer in 2008 to explore which cities worldwide have built the strongest brands. This year, we evaluated 104 cities from an international tourism perspective. Which cities are doing this most successfully? Who has the best reputation? Which global cities are underperforming, and who are the tourism leaders of tomorrow?
Our approach
We looked at two important variables: assets and buzz.
1. The strength of each city.
Assets are factors that are important to global travellers such as weather, cost, and the number of attractions. We also analysed aggregate data that indicate the overall infrastructure and development needed for a large influx of visitors such as travel infrastructure, crime, healthcare, and hygiene.
2. The reputation of a city.
Buzz constitutes the degree to which a city is known and positively perceived by the outside world. These values were established through a Saffron survey of over 1500 people from 10 different countries. The survey looked at the perception and reputation of the 104 cities on our list to see which were highly considered, which had top-of-mind awareness, and which were seen as being impacted by over-tourism. Alongside this survey, we also incorporated other indicators to evaluate the quantity and sentiment of the conversation surrounding each city.
Explore our previous CBB 2021 report 🗺️
For a more detailed explanation of our methodology, please download the full report here.