Travel trade a core focus in Brazil campaign
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Travel agents and the UK travel trade is to be a core part of Brazil Tourist Board’s (Embratur) strategy to promote its culture and heritage to the market, Travel Daily Media has been told.
Speaking to Marcelo Pedroso, director of international markets at Embratur told Travel Daily its campaign will feature various elements to engage the trade including fam trips and workshops.
“We are working on a programme to launch at the end of the year that will be on in 2013,” he revealed. “It will be focused on our training strategy for travel agents and divided into steps for example virtual, workshops and then want them to come and visit Brazil. The best way to sell something is to go and see it and we hope this will motivate them to showcase Brazil for its culture.”
Keen to show it is ‘more than football and salsa’, the trade campaign will be part of a larger consumer drive that was launched in London a few weeks ago.
Now launched globally and following the Olympic torch handover on Sunday, Pedroso said he was struck by the reaction on social media. “It was really incredible to follow Facebook and Twitter to see the reaction,” he said. “It is interesting as Brazilians are excited to be hosting the games as people have been waiting for something to be proud about. We saw London and it was spectacular by showcasing its history so now we want to give the world our history and culture and build that legacy for Brazil.”
In preparation for the games, Rio will see its hotel stock double by 2016, meaning an extra 40,000 rooms will be available. Work is also being done on its port area, which will see the waterfront transformed with a new ‘Museum of Tomorrow’ and work done on its historic area to provide another destination for tourists.
Pedroso is also confident the number of flights into Rio will increase in the next few years as it aims to increase global tourist arrivals from 5.4 million in 2010 to 7.1m in 2016 and 10m by 2020. Already there has been a recent 16% increase in flights from the UK to Rio.