With a focus to reinforce the importance of the growing Indian outbound travel market to the USA, Christopher L Thompson, president and CEO of Brand USA was in India from November 20- 22, 2014. Thompson had meeting with important travel trade stakeholders and media during his trip. He shared his expertise on “Public-Private Partnerships”- a major topic of debate currently in India and the foundation of the establishment of Brand USA for promoting tourism globally to the United States.
Brand USA set up its office in India in 2013 and has been highly active in the market organising a range of activities-including programmes for the travel trade, consumer promotions, public relations and media programmes. As per US Department of Commerce figures, in 2013 India was the 11th inbound tourism market for the US with 859,000 arrivals, an increase of 18.6 per cent over the previous year. From January to August 2014, 702,031 Indians travelled to the US, an increase of 10.5 per cent over the same period last year.
Thompson was impressed by the strength and depth of the Indian market, “International tourism is a significant contributor for creating jobs, growing exports and driving economic growth. Indian travellers form an important segment in the growth in visitor arrivals to the US. We are happy to have our presence in India and look forward to welcoming more Indian visitors to discover this land like never before.”
Thompson has nearly three decades of experience in the tourism industry. In his first year as president and CEO of Brand USA he lead the organisation in growing the international visitation to the United States by 1.1 million incremental international visitors.