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According to tourism officials, Orlando in the state of Florida has welcomed a record-setting 72 million tourist last year. The 5% year-over-year increase in visitors was powered by domestic travellers which help Orlando to hold its title as the most visited destination in the United States.
“The success in Orlando is great, not just for this iconic destination, but for travel as a whole,” said Roger Dow, CEO, U.S. Travel Association, who was recently in Orlando for the announcement of the 2017 figures.
Tourism in Orlando and other parts of Florida took a toll last September for almost a week during the preparations for and the aftermath of Hurricane Irma on the peninsula.
After the hurricane, Visit Orlando, the area’s tourism board, launched social media and publicity campaigns that showed central Florida was open for business. Orlando’s record number of visitors has been built on the continuous addition of new attractions and rides at the area’s theme parks, said George Aguel, CEO, Visit Orlando.
In order to lure more tourist, Disney World opened up a new section of Animal Kingdom, Pandora-The World of Avatar, and Universal Orlando Resort opened a new water park, Volcano Bay last year. This year, Universal is planning to launch a ride based on the “Fast and Furious” movie franchise and Disney World is opening another “Toy Story” ride. In 2019, Disney World will launch “Star Wars” land and SeaWorld Orlando will introduce “Sesame Street” land.
“We’ve learned from history that it’s not enough to just build it and hope they come,” Aguel said. “We work really hard to keep that messaging, marketing globally.”
Domestically, Visit Orlando put an added emphasis on marketing to the northeast United States last year. Orlando International Airport last year became Florida’s busiest airport.
“You just have a huge population base there and they come for a good length of time,” Aguel said.
Source: travelnewsdigest.in
