Fascinated by theme parks

Rocky Too, Senior Vice President—Sales & Marketing, Genting Malaysia Berhad, talks about the importance of the Indian market and the boom they expect once the 20^th Century Fox World Theme Park opens doors.

Anupriya Bishnoi from Malaysia

Q. Tell us about your Indian clientele.

India has been a very important market to us. Since Indians love the concept of theme parks, Resorts World Genting as a holiday destination appealed so much in the past to Indian visitors when our indoor and outdoor theme parks were still open. We used to have over 200,000 Indian visitors visiting us annually, however we saw a reduction since the closing of the theme parks late 2013. But we are seeing a good influx of Indians coming back since 2017 with the opening of new attractions and a new mall. We are confident to see even more of tourists from India coming in the near future with the opening of the Skytropolis Indoor Park and the 20^th Century Fox World Theme Park, a first-of-its-kind in the world scheduled to open soon. We are expecting a minimum of a three-day stay from this market.

Q. Which are your key source markets in India?

The key markets for us would be Delhi and Mumbai. A lot of South Indian travellers also visit their relatives here. This is also because the southern part of India is closer to Malaysia so there is definitely a close bond between the two countries. Now, with airlines flying to tertiary markets, we should be able to see a lot more tourists from India.

Q. What kind of challenges do you face?

We do not have enough rooms despite having seven hotels with over 10,000 rooms. Last year, we closed our room occupancy at 96 per cent. A majority of our arrivals are based on membership. Close to 80 per cent of our rooms are taken by our members (we have over 4 million members) and 20 per cent by FITs, OTAs, MiCE travellers and other tourists. Once our park opens doors, we hope some of the membership allocation will be open for our new client base. So, the experience is going to be unique to the world apart from being the world’s first.

Q. How long will it take the Indian market to stabilise?

Once the park opens, the Indian market is set to stabilise. During my sales trips to India recently, tour operators were curious to know more about the 20th Century Fox World Malaysia. Also, people want something new to experience beyond the Petronas Twin Towers when they visit Malaysia. Hopefully, with the opening of our new theme park, Indians will get a new and adventurous reason to visit Resorts World Genting as we have everything under one roof. Even the tourism board of Malaysia is looking forward to this opening.