Every year, Game of Thrones gets bigger. And every off-season, countries and cities play a lottery game and attempt to lure the show into their area to film the outdoor locations of Westeros and Essos. Increasingly, those wins have gone to Spain, which has teampted HBO with scenic vistas and tantalizing tax breaks. But as Northern Ireland proves, whatever tax breaks the country might have to eat is worth it in the long run. According to NI Screen, which is a partial funder of the series, the show has poured over £150m into the economy of Northern Ireland since it first started filming there back in 2009. That works out to just shy of $195 million.
Now, that might seem like a whole lot, but Northern Ireland has benefited by being the only country which has been used for outdoor locations on Game of Thrones every single year since the show began. Other countries have had good runs, most notably Croatia, which the show used to film scenes in King’s Landing and other areas from Season 2 through this past year, but only Northern Ireland has been as heavily used for multiple locations every year.
According to the BBC, NI Screen Chief Executive Richard Williams said:
"In terms of jobs and services here, we’re just creeping up to £150 million across the six seasons. To be very clear about that, that is spent on people who live here and on services that are provided by people here."
So that number doesn’t even include the explosive growth in tourism that has occurred from travelers trying to get a glimpse of Westeros—or, if they travel at just the right time, a glimpse at filming the next season. Said Judith Webb, Tourism NI’s Experience Development Officer:
"We can see already that businesses are growing on the back of the Game of Thrones series. Two years ago, there were three operators promoting Game of Thrones experiences and now we’ve over 25 with more in the pipeline. Those businesses are also reporting that business has doubled each year upon year which is just tremendous. People come for Game of Thrones and stay for Northern Ireland."
Let’s hope that, with only two more seasons of the show to go, the tourism industry keeps benefitting long after our adventures in Westeros come to an end.