Singapore aims for Record Numbers of Middle East Travellers for Shopping Festival

Singapore will be rolling out a range of special travel packages and promotions for visitors from the Middle East this year, as the South East Asian nation looks to beat the previous record-breaking performance of the “Great Singapore Sale”.

Now in its 13th year, the event has become an important attraction for Singapore, with total retail sales topping Sin$5 billion in 2005.

“The Great Singapore Sale is one of our most popular promotions and coincides with one of the peaks of travel numbers from the Middle East,” said Alan Tan, area director, Middle East and Africa, Singapore Tourism Board.

The event, which runs from May 26 through to July 23, sees stores across the island offer discounts of up to 70%, in addition to a range of special promotions and competitions.

In addition to the bargains on offer, the Great Singapore Sale occurs at the peak of the summer tourist season, with visitors from across the Middle East flying to Singapore for its attractive climate and sights.

Because of the success of the promotion, visitor arrivals grew by 8.6% to 746,541 visitors in June 2005, with high numbers of visitors from the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.

“We broke a number of records in 2005, and – given the continuing upward trend in visitor numbers this year, we’re eager to see how many people we can attract from the Middle East,” added Tan.

This year will also see the first-ever participation of a team from the UAE in the Great Singapore Shopping Challenge, where teams of international shoppers race through malls to compete for the Sin$10,000 cash prize.

Teams will each be given Sin$1000 to shop for specified categories of products and the team with the greatest savings will emerge the winner. The winning team will walk away with the Sin$10,000 cash prize plus the items purchased. As consolation, all participating teams get to keep their purchases.

To enable visitors to enjoy endless hours of uninterrupted shopping, Singapore will offer late night shopping from Orchard Road to Marina Bay till 12am, during the first 5 weekends of GSS.

Tourism plays a major part in the Southeast Asian nation’s dynamic economy, generating an estimated S$10.8 billion in tourism receipts in 2005.

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