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Tourism: Bucharest Black February - a new initiative for drawing foreign tourists
The capital city of Romania is still looking for foreign tourists on the part of city breaks for cultural opportunities or entertainment as they may host a double number of tourists as compared to what they do now, appreciates Gheorghe Fodoreau the chairman of one of the main tour operators specialized in incoming, former chairman of the Na?ional Association of the Tourism Agencies (ANAT).
At present, Bucuresti has 14,609 rooms classified in hotels, out of which 1,891 rooms at 5 star hotels, 4,619 rooms at 4 star hotels, 6,606 rooms at 3 star hotels and 883 rooms at two star hotels and 610 rooms at one star hotels.
According to a press release of the tour operator for incoming the degree of occupation in winter is onlyn36.5%, the industry and the authorities not exploiting the New Year Eve and the winter holidays for drawing foreign tourists.
In February Bucharest could offer big discounts being the cheapest European capital city under the name ‘ Bucharest Black February’ appreciates Gheorghe Fodoreanu. ‘Bucharest owns a big touristic potential but we have to diversify the thematic offer, to concentrate on summer and especially winter – plus to introduce experiemental offers in February , New Year Eve and other periods when Bucharest does not have many foreign tourists.
The winter offer of Bucharest, especially the Christmas one should be included in the catalogues of tour operators for 2019.This, despite the fact that in our country the New Year’s Eve is special, the party goes on, until morning, tradition is observed and joy is inspired. 5-star hotels in Bucharest could promote the New Year Eve at European level besides the normal price of the Festive meal if 100-150 euro, with the possibility to reduce to half the tarrifs for accommodation in a period when the degree of occupation is very low’ Gheorghe Fodoreanu says.
In 2017 Bucharest received 2,043.970 tourists, up by 6.07% against the previous year when there were 1,926.919 tourists. Out of whom in 2017 1,205.066n were foreigners who represented a share of 59% of the total.
Even if the peak months are May and September, periods when there are many events,Bucharest could start to have more tourists and during the summer , when most of them are entertainment tourists. ‘’This means that Bucharest has started to be an entertainment destination. Many hotels have started to have an occupation degree higher during weekends and in summer, periods or intervals of extra-season on the part of business and events’ Fodoreanu says.
The main countries the tourists come from are Israel, Germany, Italy, France, the US, Austria, the UK, Spain, the Netherlands and among the emerging counties there is Poland and Greece.
According to the tour operator of incoming, a solution to brinwg tourists would be that în February the capital city practice the lowest prices in Europe both for shopping and accommodation (which could start from 5-10 euro per person)means of public transport, museums, etc. Such a week, which at the proposal of Inv itation Romania could be named ‘ Bucharest Black February’ (similar to Black Friday) could attract many tourists and would bring big beneficies to the capital city.