OCHO RIOS, St Ann — If you saw golfers over the weekend wielding their clubs on the verdant course of the Sandals Golf and Country Club in rustic Upton in St Ann, these golfers were not here only for the fun of it. They converged for the annual USA Travel Agents’ Golf Tournament as host Sandals Resorts International showed off its world-class facilities to North American travel specialists.

Earlier last week, the Gordon ‘Butch’ Stewart-owned chain hosted a similar golf tournament for travel agents representing Latin America, and by all indications, that was a success as well as this weekend’s tournament.

According to Sandals Golf and Country Club manager and chief organiser of the tournaments, Tony Ebanks, Sandals has embarked on a sweeping campaign to showcase its properties to travel agents, and by extension the various target markets worldwide, using golf as a common platform.

“We are still looking to expand into some of the markets that we have not been able to tap into, and that was the reason that earlier this (last) week we hosted the Latin America tournament,” Ebanks told the Jamaica Observer yesterday.

A tournament for Canadian travel experts has already been planned for October, but the Jamaican-headquartered resort chain is looking to expand into further markets.

“We wanted to get into South and Central America and some of those travel agents into our country. Next month we will have our Canadian version, and what we are working on is a European version,” said Ebanks.

“We hope to invite people from France, Italy and Spain and the traditional UK, and ultimately what we would like to do is have one event with all the regions to play in what is a sort of international friendly, just to sort of bring everybody together under one roof to play a competition,” he added.

Ebanks said the USA tournament, in particular, has grown in the sense that representatives from states outside of the traditional and strong market regions have competed in this year’s tournament.

“It has got better in the sense of capturing a wider diversity of people from the United States itself. When we started it was concentrated in mainly our key market areas, but now it has grown wider across the United States.

“Apart from traditional US north-east and mid-west, and the Atlanta area, we are now getting a lot people from the west coast. We also have quite a few teams here from Florida, so it (the tournament) captures a bit of everybody across the US,” expressed Ebanks, a golfer himself.

He pointed out that many of the travel agents in the tournament are repeat visitors, but noted that the numbers are growing for first-time participants, broadening the platform to market the resorts.

“I would have to say about 40 to 50 per cent are repeat players… and we tend to focus on that as we have people who are into golf and focus on a golfing clientele in their promotion and marketing in the US.

“But of course we want to extend it to newcomers to the island and Sandals, who all year have not been able to be a part of any of our familiarisation trips to our properties,” Ebanks explained.

The over-100 travel agents on the island’s picturesque North Coast since last week were given tours of Royal Plantation, Beaches Ocho Rios and Sandals Grande Riviera.

“There is always something new at our resorts, and for the people who are coming for the first time, they are simply blown away as they have never experienced an all-inclusive product like this before,” Ebanks added.

Ebanks is confident that having had the Sandals experience, the US travel agents will go forth and sell the resorts “from their hearts”.

“The first clients that come into their offices, I am sure they will tell them that they have to go to Sandals and that will be something that will come from their hearts,” he ended.

The golf tournament, held Friday and yesterday, was played on a four-man scramble format.