Tourism in Greece: Findings and Suggestions on How to Make More People Travel There

Example paper purchased by an alleged online credit card fraudster associated with these two individuals: Daniel Cottosantos and/or Brad Rothman.

Abstract

This research paper will look at the tourism in the past and the present in Greece and how external factors like economy and airline rates might affect the travel numbers. The goal is to examine this information and make some helpful recommendations based on the research to possibly help get more people to travel there and boost the tourism economy of Greece. Using statistics and figures compiled by professional researchers of tourism in Greece, this paper should be able to then make an overall conclusion as to what the state of Greek tourism is and if it will change in the future.

Introduction

Greece as an ancient wonder of the world has never really had an issue bringing tourists there to experience the wonders it holds but, there recently have been periods where less travel has affected the tourism economy of the country. Greece is a developed country whose economy thrives on the tourism industry and many jobs were created due to the high volume of visitors but usually only during certain seasons therefore, the native Greeks were looking to keep visitors coming in at all months of the year. Recent numbers from the Greek National Tourism Organization (GNTO) shows that there has been a fair amount of marketing of the side of hotels and other attractions in order to draw people in during the “off season” of winter.

Findings

1. Conference Tourism is a major cornerstone of Greek Tourism which is targeted at business, academic and cultural markets making Greece the number eight destination for overnight conferences. New buildings for these conferences to be held and expanding existing ones has made for a much wider range of travel guests that stay for extended periods.

2. Museums and historical aspects of the country add to the allure for travelers. They come to Greece to see attractions such as the ancient city of Athens or experience the art exhibits in the Byzantine Museum that cannot be seen anywhere else in the world.

3. Spas and Thermal Springs that are abundant in Greece bring a number of people seeking therapeutic treatments and alternative forms of healing. With an astounding 752 thermal springs, Greek tourists have the ability to go where they please within the country and still get the experience they came for.

4. Marinas bring boating fanatics to Greece to get the Mediterranean experience and sail waters they would not otherwise be able to. Greece boasts 51 Marinas with the south coast of Athens having the busiest and most popular launching points. This specific type of tourist attraction caters not only to those wishing to expand upon their boating knowledge but also to those wanting to get some initial education on sailing the Mediterranean.

5. Tourism to Greece dropped 11% between January and May 2012 due to their participation in the Euro-zone Debt Crisis ultimately making Greece seem like a poor and undesirable place to go to now because of their seemingly failing economy. People usually do not like traveling to countries on the decline; they want the next up and coming destination.

6. Travel agencies receive little to no help from the government on promoting Greek travel abroad and on top of that can sometimes take up to 85% of their overall profits. The government because of its economic crisis is using the travel agencies as a type of revenue and offering no incentives in return. Therefore, travel packages to Greece have recently become extremely cheap.

This graph shows how many tourists came to Greece each year before the economic crisis began in 2009 when it started to steadily drop and eventually reached an 11% deficit as stated before.

Conclusions

There will always be people wanting to travel to Greece yet, with the failing global economy Greece seemed to be one of the places hit the hardest. The government desperately trying to save the country by using their biggest money maker, the travel agencies, as revenue was a recipe for disaster because many tourists began to believe Greece may now be reversing from developing. Greece has many different attractions that pull travelers in and it is in general a beautiful place but, this is not always enough. Following this there will be some recommendations based on the research performed to hopefully offer some solutions to the travel industry issue arising in Greece today.

Recommendations

- Greek travel agencies should partner with those abroad in order to get travelers from all across the globe to make Greece their destination while promoting the wonders within the country.

- The economy, while not in an entirely failing stage, is desperate and that is why Greece needs to show everyone the initiatives they are taking in order to restore their country to its former glory and not to scare people away because Greece might be poor now.

- The Government needs to stop taking so much from the travel agencies and let the tourism industry speak for itself and promote attractions instead of trying to create revenue in all the wrong ways.

- Greece needs to let tourists know that they have a high percentage of English speaking natives, many great highly ranked hotels, a good number of fine dining restaurants and the above mentioned conference centers among the other attractions that make Greece a unique destination.

Greeks need to stop worrying so much about how their country looks in this time of political and economic crisis and start focusing more on how they are being viewed for the positives Greece brings to a traveler.