ARMENIAN TOURISM INDUSTRY TENDS TO LOOSE ITS ADVANTAGE OF A GOOD QUALITY TO PRICE RATIO
Aram Gareginyan

ArmInfo
17.12.08

Interview with Marketing consultant of Armenian Tourism Development
Agency and USAID/CAPS in Italy, Nadia Pasqual

Ms. Pasqual, which tourism fairs in Italy have been visited by Armenian
tour operators in 2007 – 2008? Speak on the impact of the participation
on the Italian tourism market.

This year, together with 5 Armenian tour operators, ATDA (Armenian
Tourism Development Agency), governmental entity that is entitled to
promote Armenian tourism abroad, has participated to BIT – the most
influential international tourism fair in Italy, which has been held
on February 21 – 24 in Milan. The Armenian stand has been visited
by dozens of tour operators and journalists, who were interested in
visiting the country to provide coverage for specialzed editions. To
those editions was distributed a package of information on Armenia,
as well as maps, brochures in Italian and CDs with images. Relations
with journalists are essential to obtain maximum visibility of Armenia
– either commercial, to attract more tour operators, or general – to
ensure the attention of milions of "would-be" tourists. In 2007, as a
result of ties, which had been set at BIT and another international
tourism fair in Rome, GLOBE, ATDA e CAPS organized two fam trips,
which brought to Armenia 11 journalists and 9 representatives of tour
operators. Eventually, only in 2007 Armenia had been a headline of
more than 50 articles, acquiring desired visibility for more than a
million of readers and 13 000 tourism enterprises. In that same period,
the number of tour operators to sell trips to Armenia has grown by 20%.

>From the beginning of 2008, another 30 articles on Armenia have
appeared in Italian tourism editions. At BIT, Armenian operators have
had an opportunity to establish new business contacts and refresh
the existing ones. As for now, more than 50 tour operators and travel
agencies in Italy sell trips to Armenia. Most of them have included
Armenia into their catalogues and Internet sites.

For various reasons, Armenia chose not to participate to the GLOBE
08 travel fair in March, held in Rome. Instead, they selected TTG
Incontri, the most notable business to business travel trade fair
in Italy, held in Rimini on October 24 – 26. With its participation
to those venues, Armenia intends to enforce its image as a favorable
tourism destination on the Italian market, which showed a continuous
trend of considerable increase of leisure tourist arrivals to
Armenia. Number of Italian visitors, registered at the information
center in Yerevan, has grown to approximately 62% in 2007 compared
to 2006. The pace of growth of Italian visitors, in terms of tourist
arrivals, is the third highest among European countries and absolutely
highest among European countries which do not have direct aerial
communications. These data confirm the success of the global approach,
executed by ATDA and CAPS in the promotion of Armenian tourism.

The promotion, with its target to geographic marketing, along
with professional quality activities, meant that Italian tourists
and tourism industry now know the country better. Before that, the
promotion of Armenia would come to the participation to one tourism
fair yearly, with an opaque impact on the market.

On the whole, what operational opportunities does the Italian market
provide for Armenian tour operators?

The Italian tourism market, with its annual turnover of approximately
20 bln euro, is the fourth largest market of outgoing tourism in Europe
and the sixth in the world. That is why, after a thorough analysis,
regular promotional activities have been launched, which made it
possible for the Italian tourists and operators to discover Armenia
as a destination. The work was ever more important, considering that
before the participation of Armenia to external tourism fairs had
not been backed with PR and marketing activities. I suppose that
investments in the promotion of Armenian tourism will be continued
and expanded in Italy in the near future, because the Italian market
is very dynamic and interested in Armenia.

Armenia was featured in the "La Stella del Sud" ("The Southern Star ")
television broadcast. What impact has it had on the Italian audience
and business community?

The show attracted certain attention. Despite not very favorable
airtime – 9.30 a.m. on Sunday morning, it gathered more than 22% of
audience share. I have not directly been contacted by the audience,
because the Armenian tourism agency had not been mentioned. But quite
a number of tour operators contacted me shortly after to reiterate
the necessity of major investments to get Armenia publicized through
TV and other advertisement formats.

What actions or programs have been planned for the near future to
promote Armenia as a tourism destintaion in Italy?

At the end of October Armenia participated at TTG Incontri travel
fair in Rimini. Besides, the official Armenian tourism website,
is being restyled and translated into Italian. We
look forward to increasing the distribution of new booklets in Italian,
which we hope to distribute also through the Armenian Embassy in Rome,
and offering the opportunity to Italian tour operators to reprint
them. The organization of further fam trips for tour operators and
journalists and a roadshow for tour agents in the largest cities of
Italy is also being considered.

What factors are mostly cited by Italian tour operators as primary
obstacles for their activities in Armenia?

Italian tour operators complain for high prices for accommodation and
the=2 0lack of parking areas with bars and toilets along the roads
in the regions.

They did not say what the desirable prices should be, but they
complain that the prices for services of all kinds are constantly
moving up, and the hotels are among the most expensive items in
package tours. With all this, the prices are still acceptable – in
fact, traveling through Armenia is attractive for its good ratio of
quality and price, let alone the novelty of the destination, which
in Italy is still little known.

What kind of package holidays are most demanded by Italian tourists?

Italians are mostly interested in cultural tourism of traditional
format (guided tours). Demand for natural tourism and adventure
tourism is growing, but they attract only small groups of people
at the moment. For now, promotional efforts are focused on gaining
renown for Armenia as a destination of cultural tourism. In the
future, it would be interesting to promote natural tourism – mostly
for independent tourists and the younger ones.

Thank you