ANTIGUA & BARBUDA TOURISM AUTHORITY

ST JOHNS 19 October 2009… “The Antigua and Barbuda Tourism Authority Office’s September and October UK promotion offering savings of £120 off package holidays to Antigua and Barbuda has resulted in better than expected results” announced the country’s Minster of Tourism John Maginley. The campaign was developed to help drive the winter bookings and resulted in much positive media exposure for the twin island destination with a front page banner in the Telegraph for two successive weekends.
 
Luxury Travel and Tour Operator, Kuoni, reported that the promotion helped boost Antigua and Barbuda into the top 3 sales destinations for late trading. During the promotion Antigua took in three times as much revenue as one of its Caribbean competitors and in the four weeks that the campaign ran Antigua sales represented over 35% of Kuoni’s total Caribbean revenue.
 
Equally excellent results were seen from Virgin Holidays who booked almost 2,500 passengers between 15 September and 15 October. In addition to the promotion Virgin Holidays partnered with several local hotels on island to develop a package that made Antigua & Barbuda the hottest selling Caribbean destination during the last two weeks. 
 
While the statistics are being collated the preliminary indications are that the campaign has proven to be a real success with the UK Tourist office surpassing the targets that were initially set. Most importantly the campaign has generated renewed interest in the destination and resulted in many forward bookings for 2010.
 
Minister of Tourism John Maginley further indicated that he has received much positive feedback from local property owners for this creative initiative to lock in early bookings for the season. He said “the results of this campaign shows clearly that the Government of Antigua & Barbuda is focusing its resources in the right areas that will bring the best possible return on  investments  to market the destination in the UK.
 
The Antigua & Barbuda Tourism Authority continues its campaign to aggressively promote and market the twin island destination in all its source market in preparation for the upcoming winter season.