WHILE travel companies in Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia have been severely affected by the recent collapse in Russian tourism, some are already countering the shortfall with alternatives in place.
Attanai Loychusak, director of sales at Peach Group Hotels & Resorts, which operates three hotels on Phuket in worst-hit Thailand, said: “About 50 per cent of our trade is from Russia, so we’ve seen a big effect.” He added that while Chinese operators are able to take up the slack, Peach has targeted its promotions on higher-value Scandinavian markets.
“We’ve been working closely with charter operators (dealing with Scandinavia), so if they had empty seats on their flights we could run a promotion. That means we were hurt, but have not been killed.”
Go Vacation Indonesia, which has been handling the Russian market for the past few years, has suffered a drop of 85 per cent since the rouble collapsed in December. Its executive manager for product and contracting, Marika Gloeckler, said: “The FITs taking regular flights are still coming, but not the (groups arriving on) chartered flights.”
While German-speaking markets make up the bulk of Go Vacation’s business, Gloeckler said the company is looking to China to fill the gap.
Over in Malaysia, Gordon Yapp, deputy general manager, Sabah Tourism Board, said while Russians “may choose to downgrade their accommodation (to reduce costs)”, he remains confident that business from the country would continue to grow. The NTO will lead a delegation of inbound players from the state on a sales mission to Vladivostok, Sakhalin and Khabarovsk this March. It will also continue to work closely with charter companies.
Similarly, travel businesses in Vietnam are looking for other markets. Anton Walter Jurgens, general manager, Exo Travel Vietnam, said: “Exo does not target this market, and as such we feel it much less. However, there is always a knock-on effect from situations like this and some services have dropped rates to attract business.”
The collapse of the Russian rouble has caused more than 20 travel agencies in Russia to fold.
