Press release: Hotel Booking Systems Project

Press release: 1st of July 2008

Putting Georgian Hotels on the world map of tourism
Georgian Tourism Association (GTA) facilitates registration of Georgian Hotels with international hotel booking systems.

Presentation: Thursday, 3rd July, 16 hours, Courtyard Marriott Ballroom.

With support of USAID SME project Georgian Tourism Association (GTA) has accomplished an innovative pilot project to support the access of Georgian Hotels & Guesthouses to the growing individual tourism market; the rising clientele of people who plan their vacation using the internet instead of buying package tours.

Before the project the renowned international booking systems, like hrs.com, hotels.com, expedia.com, bookings.com, tobook.com and whl.travel who are dominating the internet search engines had no or very little representatives in Georgia, apart from big hotel chains and a few pioneering hotels. This was one of the factors that made the country a difficult place to go on your own. Today the situation starts to be different.
In addition, through the cooperation with World Hotel Link (WHL), an international hotel booking network (whl.travel), the tourism association has created opportunities for guesthouses in remote, rural areas without internet access to be booked online. From now onwards Georgia is part of a worldwide network promoting the development of Sustainable Tourism.

The pilot project has supported interested hotels with hands on registration at selected booking systems and focused not only on luxury hotels but also small & medium sized hotels and guesthouses.

“Usually the problem is rather a language barrier and a difficulty to understand the very detailed procedures of different systems and not the lack of managerial skills”, recalls Beka Natsvlishvili, executive manager of Georgian Tourism Association (GTA), who helped the hotels during the process. After a short period of training on the job and the first experiences the hotel managers are normally able to handle several booking systems without further support.This is -together with an attractive offer- the key factor for success. Natsvlishvili: “Some hotels with very attractive offers had bookings in the first week after registration. Others have to register with four or more booking systems to have a constant flow of bookings. But in the long run every experienced hotel has been satisfied with the step on the international level.”

Thursday’s presentation is a starting point for future activities of Georgian Tourism Association: After completion of the pilot project, GTA invites hotels & guesthouses to become members of the association and offers support with booking systems. Furthermore GTA promotes the cooperation of hotels and tourism companies.
There is much scope for positive developments in Georgia to the benefit of stakeholders in Tbilisi as well as in the regions.

Presentation: Thursday 3rd of July, 16 hours, Courtyard Marriott Ballroom

Contact:
Georgian Tourism Association (GTA)
Beka Natsvlishvili (executive manager) mob. 899388235 or
Steffen Schuelein (advisor) mob. 895158869
Melikishvili Str. 18/II
0179 Tbilisi
www.tourism-association.ge
info@tourism-association.ge