Malaysia is seeing a return of MICE groups to the
country. It’s not up to boom-time levels yet, but operators say it is a
solid recovery. By S Puvaneswary
MICE is on the rebound in Malaysia, though group sizes are smaller than in the good times of 2008 and lead times are getting shorter.
Senior account manager MICE of Asia Experience, Saini Vermeulen, said business for the first half of the year was already more than 50 per cent of the total 2010 budget and already beaten sales for the entire 2009.
“Sometimes the lead time is less than three weeks especially from regional markets and from companies that have done business with us before,” said Vermeulen.
“It is easier to close the deal as there are fewer options required because it is so last minute. The plus factor is, because of the short lead times, hotels give good deals.”
MP Travel and Tours general manager Chris Ng projected a 10 per cent increase in MICE business this year on 2008.
The projected increase would come mainly from China, a new market for the company.
He said business from Indonesia and the Philippines, the company’s traditional markets, was returning. Group sizes of events from the pharmaceutical, insurance and banking sectors were, however, smaller due to tighter budgets.
To grow its share of the Indonesian pie, the company will engage in joint advertising activities with its partners there to promote Malaysia as a MICE destination. MP Travel and Tours also markets its Singapore associate office, Star Holiday Mart, and Ng noted that nine out of 10 enquiries from Indonesia were for Resorts World Sentosa and Marina Bay Sands integrated resorts.
More direct flights between Kuala Lumpur and second-tier Indian cities such as Hyderabad and Bangalore have improved accessibility and made it more convenient for MICE delegates from these destinations to travel to Kuala Lumpur.
A Aruldass, managing director of Tourland Travel, a destination management company strong in the Indian inbound market, said his company had received more conference-incentive groups compared with 2008 but the group sizes were reduced.
“In 2008, we had several groups with arrivals exceeding 800 delegates,” he said.
“Then, we handled a lot of group sizes between 500 and 800 delegates. So far this year, we have had no big arrivals and the enquiries coming in were for group sizes below 500.”
While venue providers expect a better year than 2009, they notice that corporate companies are still cautious with their budgets.
Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre general manager Peter Brokenshire said companies continued to plan events but on a short notice with reduced budgets.
“Since mid-2008, we noticed a shorter lead time for banquets and corporate meetings,” he said
“For banquets, the lead time had dropped from two months to less than two weeks and for corporate meetings, from four weeks to a week.
“We reacted proactively to increasingly short lead times by developing TenOnCall, our dedicated 10 meeting spaces for just-in-time bookings, in November 2008. Last year, TenOnCall was the venue for 396 meetings.”
In addition, the centre’s ‘We have a deal for you’ rewards programme provides flexible value-added options for events at the centre.
The programme enables clients to earn reward points which will be 15 per cent of the total food and beverage charges (before service charge and government tax), and redeem them against sound, lighting, video, decoration and theming packages, the five elements of the centre’s creative services.
Resorts World Genting (RWG) senior vice-president of sales and marketing Paul Chan said RWG had introduced a loyalty card last year for MICE organisers.
“They are rewarded with WorldCard points for the amount they spend on each event and this can be redeemed for subsequent functions. This way we create repeat business and a value-for-money proposition,” said Chan.
RWG also has early-bird promotions that reduce the overall package costs to encourage MICE organisers to book at least three months ahead.
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