Human Touch

MICE groups visiting Singapore have more flexibility to curate their own itineraries as the Lion City pushes personalisation

- Dominic Ellis

First impressions count. To be greeted at the end of the airbridge from our Emirates flight and escorted onto a waiting buggy must rank as one of the smoothest arrival experiences. It took 10 minutes weaving around passengers in the award-winning Changi Airport to get to the JetQuay CIP Terminal whereupon we effortlessly passed through immigration, relaxed in the comfortable arrivals lounge and walked onto the minibus with our bags collected. A perfect introduction to Singapore.

This is a city, much like Dubai, underpinned by efficiency and style, and that remains a key allure for any MICE delegates visiting the Lion City. Both cities pride themselves on safety too, another underplayed yet important attribute in these unpredictable times.

In Q2 2017, International Visitor Arrivals increased 5 percent year-on-year to 4.2 million visitors and tourism receipts also rose 5 percent to S$6.4 billion but hotel revenue dipped slightly (-1.8 percent) to S$0.8 billion amidst increased supply. However RevPARS in the first half of last year were strong, most notably in the economy sphere (+4.9 percent), with Upscale the only one in negative territory (-0.3 percent).

China, Indonesia and India were the top three inbound markets respectively in the six months to June 2017, the latter growing fastest with visitor arrivals up 15 percent to 660,000. Two other eye-catching figures were Vietnam (up 11 percent) and Hong Kong (down 17 percent). In the latest full-year figures, 180,571 travellers from the Middle East visited Singapore in 2016, led by the UAE with 80,234. Between January and October 2017, the numbers totalled 148,394.

UNIFIED AND CONSISTENT

When I first came to Singapore in 1996, the focus was transactional, the city renowned for its ‘green, clean and clinical’ sobriquet.