ASEAN market sought out by SoKor’s Jeju Shinhwa World

Original story by GGRAsia

The foreigner-only casino business at Jeju Shinhwa World, a resort on the South Korean holiday island of Jeju, is focusing on attracting customers from Southeast Asia in the aftermath of the pandemic.

That is due to their familiarity with South Korean culture as well as the prospects for improving air services from and to those markets.

That is according to Jenny Lim, chief marketing officer (CMO) at the property, which is run by Hong Kong-listed Shin Hwa World Co Ltd. Ms Lim made the comments during a recent GGRAsia visit to the property. She mentioned tourists from Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, and Indonesia, as being among key targets.

“As the Southeast Asian markets are very mature,” in terms of their interest in overseas travel, “our team offices there have been being active with promotions”, stated Ms Lim.

Singapore “already has non-stop flights to Jeju,” and Singapore is also “a gateway to Malaysia and Indonesia with easy connections,” she noted.

Ms Lim added that key propositions in marketing Jeju Shinhwa World to overseas customers were the quality of its “people, price and location”.

Those things were “critical” to help encourage people to visit and “revisit our resort,” where they could experience “decent infrastructure for a fair price,” she stated.

She added that the island’s visitor marketing agency, the Jeju Tourism Organization, had been “very supportive” in terms of helping the island’s foreigner-only casino resorts ramp up business after the dip seen during Covid-19.

The tourism office had been working on getting “more flights,” to the island, the executive noted. Jeju International Airport is 40 minutes away from the resort by road.

Ms Lim also referred to golf, a popular sport in the region. The Jeju Shinhwa World site benefitted from having “10 golf courses” within a 20-minute drive. “That is an absolute advantage,” she stated.

She suggested the Philippines and Vietnam would also provide opportunities as source markets of customers, as or when direct flights from those countries to Jeju became available.

Recently, however, Shin Hwa World Ltd. halted its search for suitable land in the Philippines for a planned development.

To learn more about how the Hong-Kong listed integrated resort operator plans to further branch out and reach more ASEAN tourists, read the original article by GGRAsia at https://www.ggrasia.com/jeju-shinhwa-world-eyes-se-asia-players-post-covid-cmo/