MERÇI LE MÉRIDIEN

IN the global village of today, tourism has become a very competitive industry with each Nation endeavoring to take as big a share of the cake as possible. Sadly, here in Seychelles, there are some Hotel Groups whose policy is to contribute as little as possible to the overall marketing efforts of the Seychelles Tourism Authority or to the efforts made by Air Seychelles for promoting the islands as the ideal tourism destination. Having invested in Seychelles against the background of generous incentives, these Groups’s policy is to capitalize on Seychelles traditional image, natural beauty and on the marketing efforts of others.

It is obvious that Miss Intercontinental 2007 would not have taken place in Seychelles this year if Le Méridien Fisherman’s Cove and Le Méridien Barbarons had not each decided to offer free accommodation to the contestants during the period of the pageantry. Of course, this is not surprising because Le Méridien is part of the Starwood Hotels – a Group which has always looked at the greater picture of the tourism industry, offering generous incentives to its clients and providing marketing support to several tourism destinations from where it operates.

At the end of the day, of course, it is the local management of hotels who is vested with the discretionary power of making things happen or not. In this case, Mr Dietmar Koegerl of Le Méridien Fisherman’s Cove and Mr Pierre Delplace of Le Méridien Barbarons saw an opportunity for Seychelles tourism and its international image – seized it and rose up successfully to the resulting challenges. Merçi!