17,000 spring breakers expected this year
WESTERN BUREAU – The first group of the more than 17,000 spring breakers expected to visit Jamaica this year, arrived in Montego Bay Friday.
Their arrival marked the official beginning of Spring Break, which will run until April 6. Red Stripe and the Jamaica Tourist Board welcomed the group of 67 students from United States colleges and universities at the Sangster International Airport.
“It is Spring Break 2003 and we are delighted to have this opportunity to once again welcome you to Jamaica, the home of the great Jamaican beer, Red Stripe…,” Joost Visser, Red Stripe’s demand director told the group.
This year’s number of college vacationers shows a slight increase over last year’s figures and Visser said to ensure a further increase next year, the island’s tourism players – Red Stripe included – needed to band together with tour operators and American television networks.
“The 17,000 will be slightly higher than we had last year (which) was a difficult year in light of (terrorist attacks on the US on) September 11. In previous years we were around 30,000 or even higher so obviously that is something that we want to get back to,” he said. “What is very important is that we work very closely together with the tour operators and also the American television networks because really they are driving what the most popular destinations are in terms of Spring Break.”
Added Visser: “What happens is when people see spring break Jamaica this year on television that will drive their decision for next year’s Spring Break and that’s how we ought to build it up in the next couple of years.”
The annual influx of the younger set of travellers has proved a big source of earnings for Red Stripe over the years and Visser said he expected this year to be no different.
“Spring Break is very important for us. It is one of the highlights in terms of our marketing approach towards tourism and it is a very important development of Jamaica in particular,” he said. “What is interesting for us is that we sell our beer to tourists here in Jamaica and when they go back home they hopefully continue to drink Red Stripe.”
Added Visser: “In particular a lot of the spring breakers are coming from the North-Eastern Seaboard of the US and that is also where we have our stronghold for Red Stripe distribution in the US.”
In light of the period’s importance to the company then, the demand director said they were emphasising responsible entertainment.
“What is very important is responsible entertainment. We at Red Stripe, just like the Government of Jamaica, are very determined that when people are enjoying themselves in Jamaica that they do it in a responsible way,” he said. “We are not in any way involved in promoting the sort of negative that we had in the past and were associated with for Spring Break. We want them to have good, clean fun and that is what we want them to take back with them,” he added.