The Hotel Show, held in Dubai May 15 – 17, was not merely a ‘Dubai’ show, but definitely had a regional perspective with a visible increase in visitors from GCC countries. While not appearing to be as busy as last year, the quality of participants was very high with many attendees from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It may take a while for this show to reach its pre-2009 visitor levels, yet it remains the biggest and best show covering the entire Middle East for the hospitality trade.
With new hotel safes and electronic lockers constantly in development and new developers and operators entering the market, exhibiting at trade shows is an important part of Safemark’s marketing and support strategy for our regional distributors. Trade shows are one of the most effective ways to ensure that Safemark safes and people remain in front of an important customer base. It’s also a great opportunity to reconnect with the many friends we have made across the region.
“The Middle East is an extremely important region for Safemark,” says Jennifer Ferris, Vice President Sales, Asia Pacific & Middle East. “There is huge growth in the hospitality industry here, brands such as Marriott, Hilton, Hyatt, Starwood, IHG and Fairmont are all developing in the region in a big way, and our strength in this area means that we are right here to provide their approved hotel safe solutions.”
Jennifer Ferris (left) presenting the EN5.3 safe to Meelis Kuuskler, Managing Partner at Hospitality Design Partnership, a Dubai based design firm.
The safe and locker enquiries we fielded at the show were indicative of the hot markets in the region. Dubai seems to be coming alive again and Saudi Arabia is definitely one of the biggest potential growth areas, reflected in the number of Saudi visitors to the Safemark stand. Not all of these visitors were just from the Kingdom’s mega projects (predominantly in Makkah), but showed that the increase in development is countrywide.
Qatar is another of the GCC countries that is showing strong growth especially with the slated hospitality requirements for the upcoming FIFA World Cup event seeing a huge amount of development that is scheduled for completion between now and 2022. Hotel safes will be an important amenity for these hotels as guests from all over the world will be in attendance.
“The quality of visitors was really high with many informed decision-makers amongst them,” says Jennifer. “We are very satisfied with the results and the strong leads we have made here, not only for our UAE distributor Hotelity, but also for our other distributors throughout the region.”
Safemark’s Distributor for UAE, Hotelity General Trading – The team lead by Mr. Roy (pictured left).
