TOURISM MATTERS: Reconsider The Caribbean Show

IT’S NOW OVER FIVE YEARS since we organised and held the last re-DISCOVER The Caribbean Show and I wonder if the timing is now right to resurrect the event, especially as there are positive signs being shown by LIAT to offer more affordable fares. The recently announced additional flights to and from Port of Spain are an example, with a lead-in cost of US$183.10 for Trinidad to Barbados and US$196.36 return in the opposite direction, including all taxes and add-ons.

Sadly, our national marketing agency lost interest in what was in fact a unique gathering within the region of over 20 participating territories with a common objective. Apart from the obvious increase in hotel occupancy and associated spending the scores of exhibitors generated, we had started witnessing secondary benefits, way beyond that of growing intra-Caribbean travel. St Vincent and the Grenadines especially saw the value of participation, by encouraging their smaller manufacturers and suppliers to display and promote their products. The last delegation from that country alone comprised more than 30 people.

We worked very closely with the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre to make exhibiting affordable for all, with corporate Barbados willingly sponsoring individual destination shared stands, enabling even the tiniest accommodation providers across the region to be part of a much bigger awareness picture for a nominal $50 registration fee per property. Caribbean people travel year round and just a ten per cent increase per year in arrival numbers from this market could make a massive difference to the bottom line of many tourism partners.

And before detractors point out the limited air capacity available, even if LIAT is averaging 80 per cent load factors during the summer, that still means hundreds of unsold seats are available to fill each day. Just as an empty hotel bed cannot be sold twice the same night, airlines have almost identical challenges with unoccupied seats.

We willingly gave our time and resources to mount and promote the show entirely free of any charges for eight years as we felt then, and still feel now, that there remains a huge untapped market within the Caribbean. The idea was that the event would be built into a showcase for the region, partially reversing the millions of dollars that our tourism planners have spent over the years to travel to London and Berlin for the annual World Travel Market and ITB shows.

What better way to promote our tourism offerings than to bring overseas travel agents and tour operators in greater numbers to sample the tourism product in person? Hopefully, now that tourism is now under the management of the Barbados Tourism Marketing Agency, with new enlightened thinking, our policymakers will re-consider supporting the re-DISCOVER The Caribbean Show.

Barbados still remains the only Caribbean nation which successfully put together a truly dedicated intra-regional consumer and travel trade event, which captured the interest and participation of more than 20 tourism driven countries. Plus with the new direct, twice weekly, flight from Bogota, Colombia, there is a wealth of opportunity to include destinations along the southern Caribbean coast.

Email: re-discover@caribsurf.com