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The company also acts as marketing agents for World Class Vacation Club, a vacation membership franchise system with properties in the UK, Spain, Lebanon, Australia and the Philippines and is adding new locations in the Gulf region. Travel agents may also become agents for the accommodation-based club, world Class, and continue to service clients with fights and other travel services.
Hotels may enlist to sell off room nights that may otherwise remain empty in this discount scheme and will benefit whenever the hotel is less than 75 per cent occupied. Travel agents may participate simply by registering their agency on the www.rediscover.com website, or by contacting membership central in Manama.
TTG Magazine, July 2000
World Class
Vacation Club has appointed Platinum
International in
Bahrain to act as the customer service
arm for its clients in the GCC. With
resorts properties in the UK, Austria,
Lebanon, Spain, the Philippine and
Australia, World Class launched its
family oriented timeshares vacation club
in the Gulf almost one year ago. Platinum
markets World Class from its Beirut
headquarters, and from Prague for Europe
and beyond, providing information to
hoteliers and property developers.
"Expansion in the Middle East
region is very much our current
strategy," said director, Middle
East marketing, Platinum, Richard
Trevithick. "We will now seek new
partners or franchisees in all GCC
territories and throughout the Arab
world, as well as recruit top managers
with sales and marketing experience to
train and employ local staff. In the
meantime, responsible developers are
banding together to work with lateral
thinking government officials, in order to create trading policies that
encourage trade and customer
satisfaction, according to Trevithick.
"Bahrain has taken the lead, in
[my] opinion, on legislation, and other
countries will soon follow their
leaders' pioneering lead."
TTG Magazine, July 2000
The
timeshare industry continues to gain new
adherents in the regional hospitality
trade as its credibility rises, with
further expansion predicted for the next
decade. The industry has witnessed
growth of over ten per cent a year on
average over the past decade, according
to the Travel & Tourism Intelligence
report, Timeshare: Coming of Age, and
big hotel brands with properties in the
region are beginning to sit up and take
notice. Marriott, Hilton, Hyatt and Four
Seasons all featured in the top ten
companies by sales in 1998, the last
year for which figures are available to
date. The increasing acceptance of
timeshare is mirrored by developments
within the industry itself, which is
focusing increasingly on the ongoing
value of individual customers, rather
than the traditional view of
accommodation being perceived as the
main form of income. The report points
out that using sophisticated points
clubs, for example, allows for increased
branding opportunities, differentiation
of resorts and the development of a
range of ancillary products against
which points are redeemable. Other
schemes can be linked to hotel and
online loyalty programs and options,
such as cruises or gaming. This ability
to market additional services to
the customers is drawing the attention
of the major leisure groups. The travel
trade has traditionally avoided
timeshare, which it saw as a competitor
to holiday purchases. But now, according
to the report, the advantages of a
high-value, long-term customer, coupled
with the necessary infrastructure of
distribution systems, customer databases
and brand recognition has overcome any
lingering doubts. "Timeshare
continues to be a hot topic for hotel
companies looking for
incremental business
opportunities," said CEO, global
operations, Resort Condominiums
International (RCI), John Russell.
"In its most basic application,
timeshare can be a growth driver. For
example, by adding a timeshare component
to a resort, a hotel owner can spread
the development costs over several
years. But the impact continues on the
operations side, as well. Timeshare
opens up a new avenue for building
long-term relationships with customers
and better utilizing built-in leads from
existing guest lists," Russell
added. The Middle East still has a lot
of catching up to do, though, if it is
to benefit from the timeshare
phenomenon, according to RCI: in a
company report entitled, Timeshare's
Growing Global Impact, published last
November, the region was not even
mentioned. However, according to
figures quoted in Timeshare: Coming of
Age, the Middle East was projected to
have 105 timeshare projects underway by
the middle of last year. While this is
only two per cent of the global total of
5,200, it compares favorably with
Australia's share of 1.9 per cent with
100 projects. The US and Europe led the
way with 32 per cent and 26 per cent
respectively. Major timeshare companies,
such as Interval and Platinum, are
already established in the region and
plan to expand even further. Interval,
for example, has 18 properties in Egypt
alone, while Platinum's marketers of its
World Class brands are expecting to have
six new locations throughout the Middle
East and GCC in the next five years.
"Timeshare is growing in popularity
throughout the region and we are working
with a number of well-known hospitality
brands which are currently studying the
market with a view to developing either
mixed-use or stand-alone timeshare
resorts within the next few years,"
said marketing communications assistant,
Interval International,
Sarah Scott. There remains,
though, a certain amount of skepticism
to overcome, as president, Platinum
International, Michael Tolan, explained:
"We have the job to reassure our
new clients [in the region] that we are
actually a legitimate company
selling a valuable and worthwhile
product, but once our new clients have
used the system and return home, many
rave in surprise on how nice a holiday
experience they actually had! Comments
like that make it all worthwhile.
"We see a continued trend for the
next twenty years and beyond with the
right legislative environment to foster
growth. With a population of over 300
million in the Arab world, we have
barely touched the surface of market
potential."
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