SW Germany for affordable tours
The tourism board has introduced an array of promotions, packages and deals to attract families and FITs. gives details on how the tourism board plans to focus on more sectors to push numbers from the India market…
In
a bid to encourage affordable travel, South West Germany has recently introduced attractive travel cards covering six cities of the region – Stuttgart, Mannheim, Freiburg, Karlsruhe, Constance and Heidelberg for families, groups, FITs, VFR and corpo- rate travellers. It has also introduced ‘Add-on packages’ for corporate travellers who want to extend their business trip to explore the city for one, three, four, five and six nights.
According to the tourism board, Indian travellers spend the highest number of nights (6.8 nights per visit) in South West Germany as compared to other nationalities. Over 22,000 Indians visited the region between January – November 2012 accounting for 150,000 overnights and spending 108 Euros on an average per day per person. With 350 destination specialists in India through Cuckoo Specialist Training Program for tour operators, South West Germany intends to further reach out to agents in metros and Tier II cities to increase the Indian overnight figures.
According to Hans-Jorg Hadbawnik, Regional Director – Russia and India, Stuttgart Marketing and Tourism; India is one of the most potential tourism markets for the region and it’s important to make the destination more affordable to further boost the market. He said, “With slowdown in European economy, it is important for us to make tourism more affordable. Since our region is well-connected with top cities in Europe, Indians (both leisure and business) can visit South West Germany and combine it with other countries. The perception of Germany as a business destination is changing among Indian travellers and we are capitalising on further establishing our region as leisure destination for families, FITs, honeymooners and corporate travellers. With these attractive promotions, we are contemplating a growth of minimum 10 per cent in overnights from India in 2013.”