Marriott eyes 2011 tourism recovery

Marriott International, a global hotel chain, expects the Thai tourism industry will start to recover next year on improving sentiment about local politics and easing of global economic concerns, especially in Europe.

As part of its Thailand recovery strategy, executives of the hotel chain are meeting with various partners in the industry to get their views and suggestions on how to best address the current situation.

The plan also includes sales missions and discussions with the media in various key source markets for Thailand throughout Asia-Pacific, and developing different promotional programmes to entice more travellers to visit the country.

''I would like to urge that all of us in the tourism industry _ such as hotels, airlines, travel agents, destination management companies, restaurants and retailers _ to work together around a common purpose to remind the world about what is so great about Thailand,'' said Edwin D. Fuller, president and managing director of international lodging with Marriott International Inc.

''We should jointly roll out the hospitality welcome mat for which Thailand is renowned all over the world, as one company working alone can never achieve the same impact as all of us working together.''

Cross-selling will be a key to improving results at Marriott's Thailand prop erties. It will sell promote more Thailand properties across the region and work closely with agents to restore confidence in Thai tourism.

Peter Caprez, general manager of the JW Marriott Bangkok, said he expected visitors from the Middle East would be the first group to start returning to Thailand, especially to Bangkok, starting next month.

Around 40% to 50% of next month's bookings at Marriott properties in Bangkok are from the Middle East. Most of them travel to Thailand for medical care and stay eight to 12 days per trip.

Mr Caprez said local and international corporate markets should start to pick up from July to October, while the leisure market should return in the last quarter of the year.

However, as long as the state of emergency remains in force, it will be difficult to conduct marketing, particularly for the Mice (meeting, incentive, convention and exhibition) businesses.

Russia, India, and China have high potential to grow because visitors from those markets have started to travel to Thailand.

''We won't play in a price war like many hotels. It is difficult to bring back the price once the situation is back to normal,'' said Mr Caprez.

Marriott opened its first property in Thailand in 1994 and now has 17 hotels with 5,036 rooms throughout the country. By 2012 it aims to have 21 hotels.