Networking at its best
This year as India Tourism expands its exhibition floor space by 14% at the World Travel Market in London, participants from India say that the event is a great platform for them to interact with foreign tour operators.
Raja Natesan
Chief operating officer, TUI India
WTM is different from the others as a lot of senior decision makers are present making it a good platform to network and take quick strategic decisions. There are some very nice talks with senior fraternity members and we get to learn a lot. A good blend of technology providers in travel is present and if you are ready with your strategy, you can meet everyone and finalise everything.
Pradeep Kalra
Senior Vice President - Sales & Marketing, Sarovar Hotels
From our participation at the World Travel Market 2012, we hope to meet Foreign Tour Operators (FTOs). We also hope to consolidate the existing relationships that we have had and build on relationships with new operators. WTM offers an opportunity to us to expose new products to the existing and new operators, resolve any issues that may have occurred during operations and understand the promise of future business for the coming series. The Sarovar Hotels’ strategy this year would be to evaluate East African market which is our next area of focus and to understand supply and demand dynamics along with pricing mechanism.
Kurian Varghese
General Manager - Travel Trade, Citrus Hotels & Resorts
We look at WTM as an opportunity to expose Citrus to the international market and to FTOs who come from different markets across the world. With hotels in places like Goa, Kerala, Delhi, Bengaluru and upcoming locations like Pench (wildlife safari), Jodhpur (Rajasthan) it becomes an ideal platform for us to put Citrus and strengthen the brand further globally. This will be our 2nd WTM and in the past we have attended ITB Berlin and Singapore and ATM Dubai. We are focussing on getting maximum FTOs to our stall. Appointments are already scheduled with many of them. With the help of our Indian DMCs, we look forward to have many more meetings during this event.
Satyajit Desai
General Manager–Inbound, Kesari Tours
Kesari Tours is well known, but it is new in the market as an inbound player. Hence we expect wider networking facilities which will help us establish new potential contacts, and enhance market visibility. We generated substantial business deals in the past through WTM, and have built up on the contacts established during last year’s WTM. It has been a win-win situation for the buyers and us, as many overseas FTOs were looking out for new inbound players, and there we could successfully pitch in and it resulted in good business during last year. Out mantra this time around will be to play it simple and use the platform to strengthen old contacts and take it further to help us move ahead in challenging times together.
Geetha Subramanian
GM - Marketing and Sales, Clarks Group
The Clarks Group is the one of the oldest and most friendly hotel chains in the India. True to our motto ‘Clarks Care For You’, we are expecting a good share from the market for 2013-2014. WTM is a great platform that helps us to interact with our partners from UK, Germany, France and other parts of UK directly. This year we bring to the market fully refurbished products at Agra, Jaipur, Khajuraho, Varanasi and Lucknow. This year WTM will see India Tourism expanding its exhibition floor space by 14% and creating a dedicated region, which calls for more active participation from co-exhibitors, more competition and hence more challenge awaits us… Looking at its positives, we would be blessed with more key buyers this year at the India Pavilion stands.