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China Expert To Lead Incentive Travel Growth For Gold Coast
| 28 April 2010
Gold Coast Tourism (GCT) is pleased to announce the appointment of John Chan as Marketing Manager – China, Taiwan and Hong Kong for the city’s lead destination marketing organisation.
John will be based on the Gold Coast and manage GCT’s soon to be appointed Shanghai representative staff, as he leads the promotion of the city as a business events destination on behalf of the Gold Coast Convention Bureau (GCCB), with a particular focus on attracting incentive business from throughout China.
John will also take responsibility for growing interest in leisure travel to the Gold Coast from throughout Greater China. He is tasked with leveraging in-market travel trade relationships, generating new commercial partnership opportunities and boosting the exposure and knowledge of the Gold Coast as an international destination of choice, in this all important and growing market.
He brings extensive experience to the GCT International Department, most recently as Senior Sales Manager – Greater China with Warner Village Theme Parks where he was instrumental in growing the China, Taiwan and Hong Kong markets over the past 10 years.
GCCB Director Business Events, Jacqui Taylor said John Chan’s appointment was a bold move for the city’s destination marketing organisation.
“John’s appointment demonstrates our commitment towards the development of these critical tourism markets to the city of the Gold Coast. John’s tourism marketing experience in Greater China is second to none, and we are delighted to appoint someone of his calibre to support GCCB, GCT and the industry achieve greater penetration in both the business events and leisure sector in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong,” said Ms Taylor.
The GCCB promotes the city and has a key focus on bidding for and securing major business events on behalf of the destination.
Outbound tourism forecasts place China as the Gold Coast’s single biggest international growth opportunity over the next five years. GCT forecasts Chinese visitation to increase by more than 10% over the next two years, outstripping the growth of the Gold Coast’s current number one and two international source markets, New Zealand and Japan respectively.
China is currently the Gold Coast’s third largest source of international tourists, last year attracting 102,000 Chinese visitors, an increase of 12 percent on the previous year, and spending more than $46 million in the city annually.
John Chan is fluent in English, Chinese Mandarin and Cantonese languages.