HKTB Welcomes the Largest Ever Meeting and Incentive Travel Trade Delegate and Rolls Out Brand New “Hong Kong Incentive Playbook” in Parallel

Up the game for your team! The Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) recently hosted the largest ever trade familiarisation trip for meeting and incentive travel agents, which have attracted about 110 trade partners from Mainland, Southeast Asia, South Korea and India to Hong Kong; at the same time, HKTB rolled out a brand new “Hong Kong Incentive Playbook” featuring more than 100 Hong Kong experiences. The participating trade partners experienced first-hand the activities introduced in the playbook and got a deeper understanding of Hong Kong’s rich and diverse tourism assets for meeting and incentive travel, so that they can create more innovative tourism products to bring in more visitors to Hong Kong.

Mr Dane Cheng, HKTB Executive Director said, “Over the past year, Hong Kong’s meeting and incentive (M&I) travel tourism showed a robust recovery. In 2023, among the 1.3 million overnight meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions (MICE) arrivals, more than 60% are M&I visitors, who not only have higher spender power but also attach greater importance the quality of travels. Hong Kong’s diverse tourism resources with quality and efficient trade services make it an ideal choice for M&I travel. HKTB hosted the largest ever trade event for M&I travel in Hong Kong connecting the mainland and overseas travel agents with local travel trade to maintain close partnership and to create business opportunities. At the same time, HKTB is rolling out a new thematic guidebook for M&I groups with the city’s newest, trendiest and most popular travel experiences to inspire travellers to plan itineraries with uniqueness and surprise. HKTB also encourages our trade partners to first experience these activities in person so that they can include them in the itineraries when creating products for their clients, promoting Hong Kong as the top incentive destination.”

“Hong Kong Incentive Playbook”: a comprehensive guide of tourism experiences in 5 themes

“Hong Kong Incentive Playbook” lands as a dedicated thematic website, covering five themes in “Arts & Culture”, “Wellness & Nature”, “Neighbourhoods”, “Nightlife & Parties” and “Hong Kong Signatures”. The Playbook consolidates over 100 novel and unique tourism experiences and group activities for meeting and incentive travellers, such as Chinese ink painting, traditional Taichi class, singing bowl experience, forest bathing, kayaking, mahjong carving, temple pilgrim, local afternoon tea, hot pot in Hong Kong style, Hong Kong pastry bakery workshop, tea-infused cocktail mixing, nostalgic bar party, and many more. These wide-ranging experiences will surely provide the trade with ample inspirations to create fun-filled itineraries in Hong Kong for their meeting and incentive visitors.

Last Wednesday (24 April), HKTB staged the “Hong Kong Incentive Playbook Launch and Top Agents Celebration”. In the event, HKTB introduced the Playbook, and acknowledged the efforts of outstanding agent partners. At the same time, HKTB connects the travel agents from various source markets with the local trade to explore potential partnership opportunities in the future, enhancing the knowledge of Hong Kong’s tourism asset in meeting and incentive travel for the trade from both Hong Kong and source markets.

100+ APAC incentive travel trade representatives enjoy fun-filled experiences in Hong Kong

Meanwhile, HKTB received about 110 trade representatives of M&I travel from Mainland, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia, South Korea and India in a familiarisation trip from 23 to 26 April to enjoy Hong Kong’s appeal in person. In addition to site recces, HKTB arranged different in-depth tourism experiences to trade partners according to different travel needs and interests of their respective markets in the 4-day-3-night trip.

Travel agents: Hong Kong becomes top destination among Filipino travellers
Mainland markets value diversity in itinerary

The participating trade partners shared their views on Hong Kong’s appeal for M&I travellers. Ms Maria Paz Alberto, President of Ark Travel Express Inc from the Philippines, said that Hong Kong is the top choice as an travel destination among many Filipinos, adding that many Filipinos enjoy a trip to Hong Kong whenever there is a holiday. Thanks to the short flying time to Hong Kong, after the pandemic, many incentive groups from the island country prefers to visit Hong Kong between Friday and Sunday. Ms Alberto also diverged that there will be a group of 50 delegates to Hong Kong next month and may recommend them to experience Hong Kong’s bar culture. The Chinese fan painting workshop she joined this time is also a highlight, and she find it suitable for incentive groups to try.

Ms Zhang Yang, General Manager of the Beijing Branch of Zhixiaodu (Xi’an) Cultural Tourism Company, noted that M&I groups from the Mainland focused more on the business side in the past. However, Mainland markets now seek more diverse elements to be incorporated in the trips. Therefore, the new “Hong Kong Incentive Playbook” fills the gap and enables her to learn more about Hong Kong’s heterogenous tourism elements, such as classic Hong Kong experiences, innovative cultural attractions, bars popular among young people, which could be incorporated in incentive itineraries to make visitors like Hong Kong more.

Mr Kihyeon Ryu, Manager of Global Tour from South Korea noted that the MICE recovery in South Korea is robust. So far, his company received 1.4 times of inquiries more than the same period of last year. Mr Ryu hinted that two or three corporate clients he works with, mainly insurance companies, have expressed interests in travelling to Hong Kong, with the largest group consisting of about 200 people. He added that South Korean travellers has long loved Hong Kong nightlife but is now also paying more attention to wellness experience and green tourism. Mr Ryu agreed that the Incentive Playbook is diverse in themes and comprehensive, which is helpful for travel agents to promote Hong Kong’s experience in nightlife, wellness and immersive in-depth experiences.

Mr Aoyan Adhya, Associate President (MICE) of Thomas Cook (India) Limited, enjoyed the relaxation offered by the singing bowl workshop, and said Hong Kong is never boring even in its dark! He also added that the shopping experience, evening activities and the wide range of exciting attractions also make the city an ideal destination for incentive travels for corporate clients.

Mr Kevin Kuswadi, Managing Director of Indonesian travel agent Pelangi Tour, said, Hong Kong offers many new attractions after the pandemic, such as the Hong Kong Palace Museum and M+, in addition to the city’s green nature, wellness activities and culinary culture, making the city truly attractive to Indonesian visitors who love to look for something new. He was particularly interested by the “Neighbourhoods” theme in the Incentive Playbook, as the experiences allow his clients to know more about the authentic Hong Kong lifestyle and culture and is more interesting for his clients to join and helpful for planning Hong Kong itineraries for incentive groups from Indonesia.

Highlights of the familiarisation trip

Hong Kong Incentive Playbook dedicated thematic website: https://www.mehongkong.com/hkincentiveplaybook/eng/index.html

Hong Kong Incentive Playbook Thematic Video (English): https://youtu.be/LfTSnSaWTME

Hong Kong Incentive Playbook Thematic Video (Mandarin): https://youtu.be/jroiU6iD3y4