ETW Staff– Mumbai
VisitBritain kicks off its first ever GREAT Tourism Week (GTW) in Kolkata at the Taj Gateway Hotel. GTWs are “mini roadshow” format, B2B engagement platforms that will tour nine cities across India until August 29, 2014 starting from Kolkata, New Delhi and Chandigarh in the East and North, to Pune, Ahmedabad and Mumbai in the West and ending in Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai in the South.
GTW is VisitBritain’s initiative to provide Indian travel agents and tour operators with a platform to engage and forge business ties with over 15 UK tourism suppliers, such as British Airways, VisitManchester and Luxury Hotels Group. It will be an opportunity to promote Britain’s tourism offering and discuss the possibility of developing new bookable products and packages for the Indian visitor.
Shivali Suri, country manager – VisitBritain India, said, “India is the top BRIC market for Britain and growing fast. Our trade engagement in India is crucial for us to deliver our tourism targets. The GREAT Tourism Week roadshow format will enable us to engage effectively with the pan-India travel trade, as well as providing platforms to introduce new British tourism products for Indian travellers.”
New figures show that India has become Britain’s largest BRIC market in terms of volume of visits. There were a record 375,000 visits to Britain from India last year, up 11 per cent on 2012. Expenditure figures are growing at an even faster rate. In 2013, spend by Indian visitors grew by 32 per cent to a record £441 million.
