- Amsterdam wants British men traveling to the city for drug-fueled parties to stay away.
- The city launched a campaign targeting "messy" young British men, telling them to "stay away."
Amsterdam's government has a message for party-happy British men who only plan to take drugs and make a scene in the city: Stay away.
The city's new campaign involves running online advertisements that specifically target British men aged 18 to 35. The video-based ads will be prompted by search terms like "pub crawl Amsterdam," and "cheap hotel Amsterdam," per a statement released by the city's council on Tuesday.
These videos are specifically designed to warn tourists of the consequences of bad behavior.
One clip shows an inebriated man getting handcuffed by the police, along with ominous background music. The text on the video says: "Coming to Amsterdam for a messy night + getting trashed = €140 fine + criminal record = fewer prospects."
It adds: "So, coming to Amsterdam for a messy night? Stay away."
The campaign will target British men aged 18 to 35 for now, per the city's statement. It will be expanded in the next year to repel all manner of "nuisance visitors" from other countries in the European Union.
"Visitors will remain welcome, but not if they misbehave and cause nuisance," Amsterdam's deputy mayor Sofyan Mbarki said in the statement. "In that case, we as a city will say: rather not, stay away."
Mbarki added that while Amsterdam is a bustling city, restrictive measures need to be taken to keep the city "liveable."
Amsterdam welcomes an estimated 20 million tourists every year, per Statista. This includes around a million visitors from the UK, per the BBC. The red light district accounts for 10% to 15% of its tourism, per CNN.
Amsterdam is also a cheap getaway for tourists from the UK. They can find return plane tickets to the city for $62, the BBC reported.
British tourists, lured by "steak and strip" nights and free-flow booze on canal boat cruises, have been caught urinating in public spaces, vomiting into canals, fighting, and public nudity, per the BBC.
Adding to the mix is the widespread availability of marijuana. Amsterdam is one of the only cities in Europe which sells the drug legally.
But steps have been taken by the local government to sanitize the city's image. Smoking weed in the red light district will be banned come May, per CNN. This was after residents living around the area experienced a "lot of nuisance from mass tourism and alcohol and drug abuse on the street,"
This is not the first time that Amsterdam has tried to curb rowdy tourists from tearing up its streets. In 2021, the city kicked off a similar campaign that aimed to keep out "nuisance visitors." But this campaign did not specifically target British men.
Representatives of the city's government did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment sent outside regular business hours.