French authorities are pleading with the people of Paris to offer a more welcoming face to visitors to the city. While Paris is the world’s most popular city for tourists it is also beset by a reputation as the rudest city for tourists.

At the launch of a new tourism plan at a national conference, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said, “The logic is simple. An unhappy tourist is a tourist who never comes back.”

France 24 reports that Commerce Minister Fleur Pellerin added that France must work to “recover a sense of hospitality” and warned that “too often we mistake service for servility”.

The government is aiming to increase visitor numbers from 83 million in 2012 to 100 million.

Accompanying her was Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, who said the government now aimed to attract 100 million tourists a year compared to 83 million in 2012.

Several international surveys have placed the French capital as one of the world’s rudest cities to visit. Travel website TripAdvisor ranked the French capital as the rudest city, and the results showed that tourists felt Paris had the rudest taxi drivers, waiters and locals.

This isn’t the first time the Parisian authorities have made an effort to put a smile on the face of the city. In 2010 the city had “smile ambassadors” posted at the city’s main landmarks, to offer a friendly face to tourists. Last year a “politeness manual” was provided to workers in the service industry by the Paris Tourist Board.