Greece Scores Low For Image
Greece earned one of the last places amongst the 12 most important European destinations in a recent poll conducted by the German tourism magazine Touristik Report, of which the judges were 34 of the most powerful people in the European tourism trade. Amongst the judges were major tour operators, tourism agents and significant representatives of the tourism trade.
Greece scored low in the tourism image category, one of the most significant of the survey ratings, and came in eighth, three places lower than last year, followed by Morocco, Tunisia, Croatia and Bulgaria. This is the first time that the magazine has done a comparative survey in order to highlight the differences between this year’s and last year’s results. The aim of this is not only to pinpoint the positive and negative for each destination, but also to illustrate future travel trends.
The 12 most important European destinations, according to the survey, are Spain, the Canary Islands, the Balearic Island, Italy, Turkey, Egypt, Portugal, Greece, Morocco, Tunisia, Bulgaria, and Croatia. There were nine criteria that referred to the quality of accommodation with comparison of product to price, the tourism potential of the destination, marketing, infrastructure, service quality and the overall image of the country as a tourism destination. The results indicate that competition is increasing, particularly between countries that have seen increased flights. Results for Greece appeared overall negative compared with last year. Despite having dropped from a comfortable fifth to eight place in terms of its image, Greece scored the lowest points for the category of quality in services, where last year it was one before last. Greece also holds the tenth place in the price-product category from ninth in 2006, and remains in the same position for marketing.
Greece did however score high, albeit dropping one place, in the category for potential as a tourism destination, where it now holds sixth place, and holds the seventh place for the quality of hotels. Greece dropped to seventh place for its infrastructure and airline connections.
On a more positive note, Mykonos and the Cyclades were recently honored with the Conde Nast Traveler reader’s choice award 2006. This is the third consecutive year that the Cyclades were victorious in the European category with Madeira, Capri and Sicily taking second, third and fourth place respectively. Tourism Development Minister Fanni-Palli Petralia was in Mykonos were she handed the award to the Mayor Christos Veronis.