The tourism consortium is immersed in the intense promotional agenda for 2022, presenting the city in the framework of the Dubai Expo and negotiating the recovery of air connections
Just a week ago Tourism of Barcelona and the city hall They announced an intense promotional agenda to recover the international traveler who has stopped visiting the city due to the pandemic and the restrictions. From words it has already passed to deeds with a first “strategic” action” in the coveted issuing market of Arab Emirates. And more specifically, pointing to the premium traveler‘ from this area, who seeks “genuine” experiences and travels to Barcelona attracted above all by culture, sports, shopping, climate and medical reasons. His high purchasing power It is also noticeable in the contracting of numerous services, starting with accommodation, with a significant economic impact.
With this challenge, the Barcelona delegation has landed in dubai this week, led by Mateo Asensio as Director of Promotion of the tourist consortium and connoisseur of this effervescent market, to make a presentation of the Catalan capital within the framework of the Dubai Expo, among other events. “Let’s go find quality“, he sums up. Along with the team from the Agència Catalana de Turisme, this Thursday they also met with officials from the airline emirates to address the increase in connection frequencies between both cities, key to winning back that traveler.
Asensio, by telephone, explains to this newspaper that the prospects in this regard are “optimistic.” There are currently five weekly flights, but it is planned to increase the frequencies in April and in the summer until -if there are no health surprises- the pre-pandemic normality can be reached. The promotion expert also highlights that Emirates is linking Mexico-Dubai-Barcelonain such a way that it facilitates an important connection with that desired American traveler who previously used to arrive in Barcelona via Madrid, or stayed alone in the capital.
Regain ground and more
The mission highlights how things have changed after covid. Necessary reconquer markets and survey them to find out, for example, if the two-year break has affected the projection of Barcelona or not. “A large tour operator in Dubai explained to me that he has just returned from there and has felt very comfortable, as always,” he says. From a local perspective, in Catalonia this traveler is interested in the fact that he is “respectful and attracted to the local identity“, without forgetting his passion for “haute cuisine and the commercial offer”.
“Barcelona has not lost pistonada“, values Asensio, also encouraged by the forecasts of air reconnection with Southeast Asia, both with Emirates and with Turkish Airlines and Singapore Airlines. In recent times, the consortium has held meetings with more airlines to relaunch other markets, including American Airlines and Delta.
The staging of the Catalan capital in the Emirates has focused on that traveler very ‘premium‘ who personalizes trips and uses very private travel channels, but also the (middle-aged) agency traveler. And to sell them, “innovation, digitization, the application to plan visits to Barcelona without queues…” and the new campaigns.
Last year, the airport El Prat added a traffic of 157,448 passengers with the airports of the United Arab Emirates, half of the passengers of all the airports of Spain, underlines the consortium. Of these, 75.4% of the passengers came from the Dubai airport, and the rest from Abu Dhabi. In 2019, 689,581 passengers had circulated. It also represented the fifth market in volume of purchases in the city.
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Therefore, throughout the year there will be more actions in the area and in various parts of the Middle East.