TOURISM may be classified as an invisible earner but the income from selling Ireland as a desirable holiday destination is decidedly tangible. Bord Failte Eireann has the statutory responsibility for tourism and has a role in co ordinating the service industry's commercial evolution. Increasingly the board is adopting the business criteria of manufacturing industry, seeing itself as not merely offering a variety of agreeable intangibles but a single, distinctive product.

The days have long gone when Ireland was marketed in a polite low key, almost apologetic fashion. Today's tourism tigers talk in terms of corporate Ireland and employ a style of aggressive marketing owing much to Harvard Business School principles.

The new buzz terms are product identity, brand awareness, consumer positioning and strategic alliances, the latest objective being to create Tourism Brand Ireland".

Critics, and there are many, question the direction in which Irish tourism is travelling, fearing that the country is evolving into a charmless Disney style theme park with interpretive centres, explanatory videos and souvenir shops cheapening places of historic or natural interest.

Be that as it may the latest promotional campaign for Irish tourism was unveiled, a symbiotic alliance between high profile tourism related business and the bord's international marketing efforts. Up to five corporate partners are being sought who would pay millions of pounds for the privilege of having their products featured in conjunction with the national tourism effort. Companies like Guinness, Waterford Crystal and Baileys are obvious contenders but the board is also targeting firms in financial services, giftware, photographic and petrol retailing.

Naturally the campaign requires a new symbolic representation. Worryingly a redesign of Bord Failte's familiar shamrock in the circle logo is now underway at a cost, critical and monetary, yet to be determined. The result will at least be free from product placement. Won't it?.