Acting director of the travel trade and market development for Abu Dhabi Tourism, Husain AlHashmi, sat down with Travel Bulletin at Abu Dhabi?s first UK?showcase event to discuss tourism updates, what to expect for the rest of the year, and the importance of UK?agents.
Tourism plans to come
We are planning to exceed our 2019 visitor numbers, and we want to reach our 2030 target of 23 million visitors. We are working very hard to achieve these targets - we actually launched this target before the pandemic, but we still believe we can achieve these goals. Being that the UK is in the top 10 source markets for us, historically, due to the long relationship that we have. We have a lot of other attractions that are growing that we are highlighting at this event, for example, at the end of this year the Ibrahimic House will be completed. At this attraction, a synagogue, a church and a mosque will all be side-by-side, so this is truly one-of-a-kind. The Sheikh Zayed National Museum will also be coming in 2025. We?re also currently investing in our culinary scene.
Summer promotion
This is actually the first time we?re actively promoting Abu Dhabi as a summer destination. The campaign is called ?Summer like you mean it!?. With this, the summer pass has been created to support the campaign, where visitors get to experience Abu Dhabi with this value-added pass. There is access to three theme parks, transportation access, and access to the Jubilee Pass, which covers the cultural sites, and one free access to the Louvre.
Abu Dhabi Showcase event
The whole idea of this showcase event is to build a deeper relationship with the trade, and this won't be the last time we do something like this.?We want everyone to get to know us better, and agents know they can sell holidays throughout the whole year. Our infrastructure, properties and attractions are designed to make us a year-round destination ? attractions like Warner Bros. World and Ferrari World are always open.
Travel agent importance
Travel agents are hugely important to us. Agents have gained a lot of trust during the pandemic, due to the uncertainty surrounding travel, and we want to capitalise on this. This year, we will be continuing our fam trips. What we did is we carried out fam trips thematically, for example a luxury-focused fam?trip for luxury sellers. We also created an e-learning programme and now, running until December, we have an incentive programme for the top sellers. We want to keep working on joint marketing activities with our trusted agent partners.
