Hundreds of hoteliers throughout the Caribbean can now earn healthy revenues with little or zero marketing costs…
Hundreds of hoteliers throughout the Caribbean can now earn healthy revenues with little or zero marketing costs.
The Caribbean Hotel Association Charitable Trust (CHACT), the body mandated to market the Caribbean with a single voice, has disclosed that effective immediately the entire membership of the Caribbean Hotel Association (CHA) will be eligible to list its inventory on the CHACT online travel site (www.gocaribbean.com) and benefit from both website and telesales through the toll-free service 1-888-CARIBBEAN .
The decision made by CHACT officials to widen the program’s benefits to many more Caribbean hotels was an easy one. CHACT chairman Ralph Taylor said: This will help drive much more business to the Caribbean in 2003. He explained that an easy sign-up process is now available online.
Expedia, Inc’s private label solution, Worldwide Travel Exchange (WWTE(tm)) provides the booking engine, handles inbound telesales, customer support and travel inventory to the travel site www.gocaribbean.com. In a user friendly on-line environment, hoteliers are able to manage their room allotments and rates depending on their current or projected occupancies.
CHA member hotels that are currently engaged with Expedia are automatically part of program, while other CHA member hotels can join with the click of a mouse.
CHACT is a public/private sector conglomeration of major hotel chains, airlines and credit card companies which have joined forces with both CARICOM and non-CARICOM nations to market and promote the Caribbean as a single destination. A regional fund has enabled the launch of a television campaign dubbed Life Needs the Caribbean. The campaign, launched in August this year, resumes early next year.
The overall intent of the campaign is to brand the region and, thereby, compete with other regions of the world that have been attracting increasing Caribbean market share of the US outbound traveler for nine consecutive years.
Eighteen destinations are participating in the campaign. They are Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bermuda, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Montserrat, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Maarten, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, Turks and Caicos and the United States Virgin Islands.
Theodore is the Co-Founder and Managing Editor of TravelDailyNews Media Network; his responsibilities include business development and planning for TravelDailyNews long-term opportunities.
