Roy to woo South
American tourists
PHILIPSBURG--St. Maarten has maintained a marketing presence in South America over the years, especially after the late 1990s when intense campaigns were launched. Building on this, Tourism Commissioner Roy Marlin is hoping to cultivate more tourists from the continent, to create year-round tourism for the island.
Winter in South America occurs during the summer months in North America, the island’s traditional tourism market. Attracting tourists from South America offers an opportunity to increase hotel occupancy in the off-season months.
One tool already being eyed is the translation of the existing St. Maarten Tourist Bureau Website into Portuguese and Spanish. This will give potential visitors easier access to information in their own languages.
Also being worked on is linking the Website with those of wholesalers such as Expedia.com, one of the island’s largest sellers.
Marlin has enlisted the help of American Airlines (AA) to tap into the South American market more by identifying possible flight connections for passengers wanting to travel to St. Maarten.
Marlin had discussions with AA officials in Miami earlier this week. The initial idea is that passengers can reach St. Maarten by flying to Miami and connecting with AA feeder flights here.
To drum up publicity for the connections, Marlin said a marketing campaign in cooperation with AA would be put in place to help push sales. A plan on how to approach this marketing blitz will be formulated in the next 30 days and then shared with AA.
Attracting tourists from markets other than North America was one of the key components of the island’s 10-year Tourism Master Plan TourMap. Also mentioned was building up a presence in Europe as an alternative market. Marlin is also looking at increasing promotion in Europe, especially now that the euro is much higher than the dollar. Meetings with airlines that once flew to St. Maarten from Europe and newer ones are expected soon.
Meanwhile, the commissioner acknowledges the importance of attracting Caribbean tourists who spend on average more than North Americans, as their primary reason for visiting is duty-free shopping. Reviving marketing promotions in the region is also on Marlin’s agenda.
Asked where funding for these marketing campaigns would come from, especially as funding had been almost non-existent over the past five years, Marlin said finding funds would be easy, as he was Commissioner of both Finance and Tourism. “We will have to look at means and ways to generate revenue to increase the tourism marketing budget.”
