US market share at an all-time high for the Caribbean destination. With the final numbers tallied, destination Pure Grenada records total arrivals of 100,654 for January 2018, an increase of more than 30% over January 2017 (75,600).
In addition, all visitor categories reflected an increase including Stay over (13,815) up by 13%, Cruise (82,797) up by 37% and Yachting (4,042) up by 43%.
CEO of the Grenada Tourism Authority, Patricia Maher, stated, “We are delighted with the performance, and everyone on the ground is enjoying the results of the hard work by all the tourism stakeholders. The excitement with the opening of Silversands Grenada later this year is palpable as it is the first hotel development on Grand Anse Beach in over 25 years. Work is also progressing on the Kimpton Kawana Bay, another hotel development on Grand Anse Beach, which will be open in 2019. We will grow our room stock by 32% in the next 2 years which will lead to increased capacity to almost 3,000 licenced and certified rooms by the Grenada Tourism Authority.”
To further support the destination’s developing tourism industry, the Grenada Tourism Authority (GTA) and the Grenada Airports Authority (GAA) representatives attended Routes America 2018 from 13-15 February in Quito, Ecuador and met with 10 airlines to discuss the expansion of service or new routes. The interest in Grenada is growing, and with the 16% growth in arrivals from the US market (67,250) in 2017 over 2016 and US market share at an all-time high of 46%, this strong performance data piqued the interest of the US-based airlines.
Building on this momentum, the marketing and sales team attended the New York Times Travel Show, CHTA Marketplace in Puerto Rico, Boston Globe Show and the Telegraph Travel Show in London in the first 2 months of the year. Virgin Atlantic in collaboration with Unilad Adventure launched a destination video on social media that shares the many reasons to visit Grenada, Spice of the Caribbean in 2018. With all this heightened activity, the GTA forecasts a 6% growth in total visitor arrivals performance for 2018 that will benefit all the citizens of Grenada, Carriacou and Petite Martinique.
Grenada Tourism Authority
