DXB Entertainments banks on tourism push

Company targets attracting 6.7m visits to Dubai Parks and Resorts this year

DXB Entertainments, the Dubai-listed owner behind Dubai Parks and Resorts, said it plans to capitalise on growth in visitor numbers to Dubai from key source markets to achieve its footfall targets for 2017.

In an interview with Gulf News at the Arabian Travel Market (ATM), Vinit Shah, chief destination management officer at Dubai Parks and Resorts, said the company is also progressing on schedule to open two upcoming attractions; Six Flags and a Legoland hotel.

The Six Flags park is expected to open in 2019, but no timelines has yet been confirmed for the Legoland hotel.

For this year alone, however, the company has set targets of attracting 5.5 million unique guests to Dubai Parks and Resorts, and 6.7 million in total visits.

“If you see the last results published by Dubai Tourism on the number of visitors to Dubai, the numbers seem to be increasing. They’ve done a lot in terms of opening up different markets, so visas have been relaxed for China, Russia, and India, so all these elements will help in bringing more people into Dubai and into Dubai Parks and Resorts,” he said.

For its theme park in Dubai that opened in late 2016, the company is targeting the GCC, India, and the UK as its primary guest markets, and China, Russia, and Germany as secondary guest markets.

Shah said that despite declines in the values of both the Euro and the British Pound, visitor numbers from Germany and the UK to Dubai have registered an increase. He added that he was confident the segment of population Dubai Parks is looking to attract will continue to visit Dubai.

Growth target

To help achieve its growth target, DXB Entertainments has a network of representative offices in markets such as India, the GCC, Germany, China, and West Africa that tie up with tour operators to create packages to attract visitors to Dubai.

“The demand [for theme parks] has been there even from a global perspective. Nothing like Dubai Parks exists within a four to six hour flying distance. The closest on the west is Paris, and on the east, the closest are Singapore and Hong Kong, so there is an untapped demand from the entire Middle East, North Africa, India subcontinent region that doesn’t have something like this, and that’s the market we’re catering to,” Shah said.

Away from theme parks, DXB Entertainments last week announced plans to grow its hotel brand Lapita, across the region.