Kahini Chakraborty – Mumbai
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Fabio Gerola
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Trentino Tourism is looking at targeting FIT tour operators catering to high-end clients from the Indian market. Having 40 ski resorts, it will promote destinations such as Madonna di Campiglio and Lake Garda and Val di Fassa besides the town areas. Speaking exclusively to Express TravelWorld, Fabio Gerola, – marketing manager, foreign market department, Central Europe and Russia, TRENTINOSVILPPO said, “This is the first time we are visiting India and we are still understanding the market. We have had few meetings with the travel trade and have been given to understand that Trentino is a new destination and there is an interest in specialised tours. It is the right time to introduce the destination as travellers are looking for more experiential tours. Hence we will be sending them information on the destination according to their needs as there were some tour operators who spoke about honeymooners, students, FITs. Another step will be to organise workshops and conduct FAM trips for the travel agents to get first hand experience of the destination.”
The board is looking at going step by step with its promotional activities and is looking at working with travel agents doing specialised tours. They would look at offering one week itineraries from skiing point of view and in summers offer three-four nights combining it with other destinations. “We have different accommodation options from three-star to five star hotels, chalet residences, bed and breakfast, as well as agri tourism products. We have hotels that are managed by the owners,” he added.
About the potential of the Indian market, Gerola opined, “It is a good option for us. We don’t want to have 1000 tourists at the moment. We would like to begin slowly in a new market and then offer specialised products. We host about four million tourists every year. We have about 1,500 hotels plus a lot of chalet residences, bed and breakfast etc. We also have capacity of half a million beds.”
