Festival tourism: the way for small hotels

She was making a presentation on Marketing through Festival Tourism on the second and final day of the Fourth Encounter of the Inter- American and Caribbean Network of Small Hotels, held at the University Inn and Conference Centre on the campus of The University of the West Indies at St Augustine. The encounter was organised by the Organisation of American States; Red Interamericana & del Caribe PEQUENOS HOTELS, and the Small Tourism Accommodation Owners of Trinidad and Tobago.

Rostant said Scotland generates revenue year round by promoting itself as a festival destination. She said in a survey of the visitors, 92 percent of them described the festivals as “must see” events which they would not have had a chance to see otherwise. She said Australia was another example, where many states facing rural decline had made efforts to revive their communities by hosting rural festivals and now these festivals have proliferated and are creating non-traditional niches for tourist attraction. She said that a study conducted by the University of Wollongong in Australia between 2005-2008 with the festival organisers found that hosting the festivals stimulated meaningful monetary benefits for the surrounding community through spending by the visitors. She also cited the Envision Festival in Costa Rica, held over three days in February, which she said demonstrated the people’s “passion for life through music, art and dance.”

She said Festival tourism creates an ecosystem including not only the festivals themselves but different types of sustainable enterprises, cultural exchanges, the showcasing of unique, creative and cultural products “which we know we have a plethora of in the Caribbean,” marketing opportunities for key stakeholder groups and audience development, “which is again critical for the sustainability of anything.”

Another presenter, Rebecca Gutierrez, Director of Marketing for OBM International, a leading global architectural firm based in Miami, Florida, who also holds a Master’s Degree in Business Administration and Masters Certification in Hospitality and Tourism Management, highlighted the opportunities for tourism promotion in Social Media Marketing Trends and Tools. She said You Tube is an invaluable asset for the owners of small hotels and that short videos dominate attention spans, adding that a mobile website is a necessity. She showed scores of short videos about what might seem mundane things such as boarding a bus in Trinidad and Tobago; holidaying in Dominica; interesting things about other destinations, even videos shot with smartphones. She drew the attention of the participants to the thousands of people who had watched these videos, pointing out that all those were potential visitors to their properties. She said that 76 percent of visitors to a small hotel property will share pictures of their vacation and property owners should encourage this kind of sharing through the designation of “selfie spots” which she said are beginning to pop up at many hotels. She said that the “selfie spot” is simply a position somewhere on the property marked out by the owner from which guests are encouraged to take their “selfies” because it provides a dramatic backdrop that will attract other visitors. She said a study found that 52 percent of social media users admitted that their travel plans were inspired by photos posted on social media sites by their friends; 55 percent of vacationers liked pages related to their trips and 96 percent of millennials – the much-talked about millennium generation comprising persons born after 1980 and coming to young adulthood around the year 2000 – share photos.

Last Thursday, the opening day of the encounter, Vicki Assevero, the manager of the San Antonio Green Market in Santa Cruz set the dominant note for the day with her presentation on Sustainable Tourism through Agriculture, which Denise Aleong-Thomas, Vice-President (Caribbean) of the Inter-American and Caribbean Network of Small Hotels said really kick-started the encounter by making the point that agriculture depends on tourism and tourism depends on agriculture. “And that is a good way of trying to diversify the economy and also stimulating economic growth and stuff because what we are saying is that if tourism supports agriculture and agriculture supports tourism then both sectors would grow and therefore generally the economy would grow.”

Aleong-Thomas said the point about the need for collaboration between the agriculture and tourism sectors was also made by the St. Lucian Minister of Tourism, Dominic Fedee, a special guest at the encounter. He told delegates that when he visited a destination he, like most tourists, wanted to buy something authentic from the destination and if he is buying something authentic then he doesn’t care how much it costs.

The subject was extended into Thursday afternoon’s session of the encounter with a presentation by Dr Leslie-Ann Jordan-Miller, senior lecturer in Hospitality and Tourism Management at the University of the West Indies, who, speaking on Tourism Product vs Hotel Room, suggested that instead of just selling a hotel room, small hoteliers sell a product- the authentic, heritage destination that is Trinidad and Tobago. “She spoke about taking some of our tourists to some of our weekend markets and having specialised, customised activities such as teaching them to make a coconut bake or callaloo – culinary tourism,” Aleong-Thomas said.