(Press Release)
Tourism Minister Charles Fernandez has issued a call for the country’s Destination Marketing Team to employ new and exciting marketing strategies to bolster Tourism activity.
The charge was made at the opening ceremony of the annual Marketing Strategy Meeting held Tuesday at the Carlisle Bay Resort.
The meeting deemed extremely important; comes at a time when islands within the region and as close as the sister island of Barbuda have been devastated by Category 5 storms Irma and Maria, with a massive thrust ensuing to assure the International community that Antigua is indeed open for Tourism business.
According to Minister Fernandez, “we have organised this strategy meeting in order to ensure the future success of Antigua and Barbuda’s Tourism Industry…not only is the session organized to strengthen our tourism strategy, but to set in place our plan for 2018 and beyond.”
The Minister continued, “These are indeed challenging yet exciting times, which require creative thinking and solutions and the next few days will give us the unique opportunity to get and take on board feedback from critical product components, to ensure that our marketing plans and programs meet the needs of the industry”.
Marketing teams from the USA, Canada, the UK, Europe and from within the Antigua and Barbuda Tourism Authority and the Ministry of Tourism where urged to use the 3 day session to pool their creative expertise in formulating the most effective ways to market and promote the very critical tourism industry.
The Tourism Minister is of the firm view that such creative and innovative thinking is also quite necessary since visitor demographics and preferences change constantly in these extraordinary times and hence extraordinary responses from all of us as tourism and travel professionals are needed.
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The Minister of Tourism is asking for creative and innovative thinking because we are in challenging and exciting times. I look forward to hearing of the outcome of the creative strategy to ensure the international community Antigua is open for business otherwise this is BS and meaningless rhetoric.
This is not new Antigua has been without an experienced sales and marketing Tourism Minister for a long time. Lester Baird no fan of mine was the best Antigua has ever had. Since he left they are all hacks without thectraing or experience to do the job well.
It’s the very reason why Antigua finds itself dependent on the hotel owners to find and bring in their guests. Tells you why Hotel Owners use portions of ABST for marketing.
The strategy should start with reducing gun crime and begging , along with animal cruelty including poisoing of poor innocent dogs and cats. Taxi fares are extortionate. The dollar is strong against the pound. If you want people to patronise Antigua you need to reduce taxi fares so that we can actually experience the island without it costing hundreds of dollars, We can’t patronise the restaurants as it’s too expensive to go there by taxi, your fuel costs are out of line with the rest of the carribean. The price of crude oil is but your fuel is double in antigua versus other carribean island. We cant afford your taxi fare price strategy.
Take the beggars off jolly beach. They are an intimidating nuisance. As tourists at jolly we don’t feel safe on the beach. There are 10 beggars/hawkers asking for money within the first half an hour of relaxing on a sun bed. A tourist was held at gunpont in this resort three weeks ago. Luckily security were on the case.
The lobster guy onJolly beach is in prison for ripping off tourists. Taking there money for trips etc and then he is no show. The resort is full of police taking statements but they have little interest..in solving the problem…..
The beach is not safe at night. Full of predators in the bushes. Watching and calling out .selling drugs and we have to quickly abandon the beautiful sunset and then stargazing.
Ban guns. Ban beggars and hawkers without a licence. Stop turning a blind eye to corruption and illegals, stop selling passports to terrorists who bring in there containers full of guns. Customs not checking containers until days later and taking a back hander not to see the guns. 19 shootings this year not to mention road deaths and suicides . The worst since 1985.
This is our 21st time Antigua. As British tourists. Give us a great reason to come back ?,
The country needs cleaning before we invite anybody here. St. John’s is a rubbish dump with craters in the roads and stagnant water holes for breeding mosquitoes. We need to clean it first then market after.
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