Strategy, tested against real organisations
A look at how we've worked alongside leadership teams to close the gap between strategic intent and delivered results.
Cape Town Tourism × Aeon Black
Strategy operationalisation for a destination marketing organisation
The context
A city destination marketing organisation faced a challenge common to DMOs across the continent. Its primary government contract was going to competitive tender for the first time, exposing an over-reliance on a single revenue source. A recent restructuring had left the leadership team stretched and reactive. The board needed a credible plan to defend the core business and a realistic path to revenue diversification, at the same time.
Our approach
Aeon Black opened with a two-day facilitated workshop with the full executive team to surface the organisation's real strategic position and align leadership on priorities. From this we built a structured multi-horizon framework separating three distinct phases of work: defending and optimising the core revenue base; building diversified commercial income streams under separate fit-for-purpose structures; and repositioning the organisation as a long-term intelligence and coordination platform for the destination. Each horizon has its own logic, ownership model, and funding mechanism.
We followed with one-on-one executive interviews, produced a CEO strategy report, and ran a parallel alignment workstream with the primary government funder to build a shared marketing coordination framework. The engagement concluded at a board session where we tabled business cases for new revenue streams, three budget scenarios with pre-agreed trigger levers, and the organisation's first formally adopted KPI scorecard.
What we delivered
- Two-day executive strategy workshop
- Multi-horizon strategic framework and CEO strategy report
- Executive performance framework: KPIs, accountability structures, 10 strategic pillars
- New revenue stream business cases and three-scenario budget modelling
- Government funder marketing alignment workstream
- Board workshop facilitation (June 2026)
Table Mountain Aerial Cableway
Visitor experience and commercial strategy
Turning strong operational performance into a focused, sequenced growth and implementation agenda.
TMACC operates one of Cape Town's most visible visitor experiences, in a complex environment shaped by weather, capacity, safety and long-term concession requirements. We designed a strategy and implementation process around clear diagnostic logic: what needs improving, what needs protecting, what needs proving to stakeholders, and what can be delivered within practical constraints.
Bardahl
Case study details coming soon.