- Strategic Pivot: Minister Olga Kefalogianni unveils “Mountainous Greece. It takes you high. All year round,” a dedicated program to reposition Greece’s peaks as primary travel destinations.
- Economic Backing: The initiative is supported by the Recovery and Resilience Fund, including infrastructure upgrades for ski centers and a new specialized digital platform.
- Domestic First: The initial phase of the campaign targets the Greek domestic market to bolster internal tourism during the shoulder and winter months.
- Policy Incentives: Enhanced subsidies through the “Tourism for All 2025” program are being directed toward travelers who choose mountainous regions.
Greece has decided, rather late but quite deliberately, that its mountains can no longer remain the quiet backdrop to a coastline-driven tourism model. A new national campaign titled “Mountain Greece. It takes you higher. All year round.” signals a shift in strategy: from seasonal saturation to geographical and temporal balance.
The initiative, presented by Olga Kefalogianni, is less about slogans and more about correcting a structural weakness. For decades, Greek tourism has leaned heavily on summer and the islands. The result is predictable: overcrowding in peak months, underused regions for the rest of the year, and a fragile dependence on a narrow revenue window.
What is now being attempted is a redistribution of visitors, income, and attention.
“For the first time, through a comprehensive promotional program, we aim to reveal and highlight another side of Greece, as part of a coherent strategy for sustainable and balanced tourism development, centered on niche forms of tourism and focused on quality growth, 12 months a year, across all regions of the country,” said Kefalogianni.
From Seasonal Success to Year-round Pressure
The Ministry argues that recent data support this direction. Tourism revenues in 2025 increased, particularly during winter and shoulder seasons, suggesting that demand outside the traditional summer peak is not only possible but already emerging.
The logic is straightforward:
- If visitors can be drawn beyond July and August, pressure on major destinations decreases
- If inland and mountainous regions gain visibility, local economies diversify
- If tourism becomes a 12-month activity, jobs become less seasonal and more stable
This is where mountain tourism enters—not as a niche, but as a corrective mechanism.
What Mountain Tourism Offers
Strip away the campaign language, and the product itself is clear. Greece’s mountainous regions are not a single offering but a layered one:
- Landscapes that range from alpine terrain to forest ecosystems
- Long-standing traditions embedded in small communities
- Agricultural production tied to local identity
- Food culture that does not exist in resort menus
In other words, something closer to what international travelers now label as “authentic experience”—a term often overused, but in this case structurally accurate.
Global travel trends reinforce this direction. Travelers are increasingly moving away from passive consumption toward experiences that combine nature, culture, and personal engagement. Greece, almost accidentally, already has the raw material. The issue has been packaging and visibility.
Policy Tools Behind the Campaign
Unlike past promotional efforts, this one is backed—at least on paper—by a set of concrete measures introduced in 2025:
- Ski resorts are being repositioned as 12-month destinations, rather than purely winter infrastructure.
- A new framework branded as “Sustainable Mountain Tourism Destination” aims to standardize and promote these areas.
- The “Tourism for All 2025“ program increased subsidies for off-season travel, encouraging Greeks to travel outside peak periods.
- A follow-up program for 2026–2027 continues this approach.
At the same time, a larger project funded through the Recovery and Resilience Facility is scheduled for completion in 2026. It includes:
- Upgrades to ski resort infrastructure
- A dedicated digital platform to promote mountain destinations
The intention is clear: visibility must be matched with usability.
Summer in the Mountains
One of the more interesting aspects of the campaign is its insistence that mountain tourism is not seasonal. The messaging deliberately includes summer, positioning high-altitude destinations as an alternative to overheated islands.
This is not just marketing optimism. It responds to a real shift:
- Summers are becoming hotter and more uncomfortable in urban and coastal zones
- Travelers are increasingly looking for cooler, less crowded environments
- Domestic tourism, in particular, is more flexible and responsive to such changes
For now, the campaign is aimed primarily at the Greek market. If it works locally—if Greeks themselves start choosing the mountains more consistently—it can then be exported as a narrative abroad.
The Real Test Is Not the Campaign
The success of this strategy will not be determined by the quality of its promotional video or the number of officials present at its launch. It will depend on something far less visible and far more difficult:
- Whether the infrastructure can support increased demand
- Whether local communities are prepared—or willing—to adapt
- Whether services can meet expectations without eroding authenticity
- Whether coordination between the state, regions, and private operators actually functions
Because the risk is familiar, Greece has seen it before: strong demand followed by uneven delivery.
Rebalancing the Tourism Map
What is being proposed is, in effect, a rebalancing of the country’s tourism geography. From the islands to the mainland. From summer to all seasons. From volume to distribution.
The government, represented at the event by Kyriakos Mitsotakis through senior officials, frames this as part of a broader effort to create a more resilient and balanced development model.
That ambition is reasonable. The difficulty lies, as always, in execution.
Because giving mountain Greece “the role it deserves” is not a matter of promotion. It is a matter of sustained attention—financial, administrative, and cultural—long after the campaign fades.
