Travel firms offer super-cheap tours to lure travelers
LookAtVietnam - A lot of travel firms have offered super-cheap tours in
order to encourage the demand, despite the input cost increases.
order to encourage the demand, despite the input cost increases.
 |
with the previous year’s levels. Travel firms have slightly increased the fees
of some tours to offset the input cost increases. Meanwhile, most of the tours
keep the fees unchanged, and especially, some tours have even seen the fees
decreasing to lure more travelers.
Super-cheap tours hit the market
It is quite a surprise that the tour fees have not increased in accordance with
consumer price index (CPI) increases. Especially, the fees of some tours have
even been lowered to stimulate the demand.
Fiditour, for example, has launched a sale promotion program for the Christmas
and 2012 New Year, under which sharp tour fee decreases are being offered to the
tours from the south to the north. Those travelers, who book the tours to Hanoi,
Bac Ninh and Ha Long Bay, now can enjoy the price reduction of 3-3.5 million
dong for 4-5 day tours, with the departure time on the days just before Tet (the
first day of the new Lunar Year is January 23, 2012).
Vietravel has also announced preferential tour fees for the travelers to the
north with the 2.5-3 million dong reductions. Especially, the travel firm has
offered surprisingly low tour fees for the tours to the flower city of Da Lat:
every traveler only has to pay 1.3 million dong to enjoy a 3-day tour to the
city, with the departure fixed in late November.
Explaining the tour fee reductions, travel firms all said that they have to
accept lower profits by lowering tour fees in order to stimulate the demand in
the context of high inflation. Big travel firms try to negotiate with
restaurants, service providers and air carriers to obtain the best airfares and
service fees, which allows them to reduce the tour fees.
Meanwhile, small travel firms complain that they are the biggest sufferers from
the CPI increases. They cannot offer tours at overly high tour fees, because
they fear they would lose clients, while they cannot set up the tour fees at low
levels, because they cannot enjoy preferences from airlines or other service
providers.
Nguyen Thi Hoa Le, Director of the Hoa Binh travel firm, also said that her firm
has decided not to increase tour fees and accept lower profits to lure more
travelers. Meanwhile, in order to compete with rivals, the firm has to offer
preferential fees for some tours.
Therefore, Le said, she expects to see the number of travelers increasing this
year, but the revenue may decrease.
Tours to near destinations, domestic tours preferred
In order to keep tour fees stable and lure more travelers, a lot of travel firms
have to change their business strategy. They have been focusing on developing
short distance domestic tours, especially the ones to islands, which have been
interested by travelers. Meanwhile, the tours to South East Asia, which were
considered the key tourism products in previous years, now are not considered
the most important markets any more.
Le from Hoa Binh travel firm said that she has to anticipate everything in order
to take initiative in providing tours. “We have our own vehicles that carry
travelers, while we have some hotels so as to keep service fees stable,” she
said.
Truong Hoang Phuong, Marketing Director of Vietmark, also said that in order to
cut down expenses, enterprises tend to choose the tours to near destinations. He
affirmed that though the tour fees decrease, the quality of the services will
remain unchanged.
Not only travel firms, but hotels also try to keep service fees stable. Do Tuan
Hung Manh, Managing Director of Mom Da Chim resort, said that the resort has a
lot of Russian and foreign guests. However, in order to help domestic travel
firms stabilize the tour fees, the resort still offers big preferences to
Vietnamese travelers.
Source: Phap luat TPHCM
Travel firms offer super-cheap tours to lure travelers | Look At Vietnam - Vietnam news daily update
No comments:
Post a Comment