Airline targets Pacific Islanders in Australia [1]
Monday, September 1, 2008 - 17:08. Updated on Thursday, September 11, 2014 - 16:09.
An affluent second generation of young Tongans born in Australia are being targeted by a regional airline, which is promoting Tonga as a holiday destination.
Pacific Blue's Australian Manager for the Pacific Islands, Edmund von Heiderbrandt, who led a group to Tonga, said today that they were visiting Tonga for the first time to try and attract Pacific Islanders in Australia to come and explore Tonga.
"We are targeting to tap into affluent second generations of young Tongans born in Australia who have been looking elsewhere for holidays and bypass their own island home," he said.
He was confident that if Australian Tongans knew what Tonga has to offer they could be attracted to come to Tonga on holidays instead of going to other countries.
The nine-member delegation, representing Tongan-Samoan travel agents, and airline personnel from Sydney, was in Tonga on a four-days familiarization visit to Tongatapu and Vava'u before returning to Sydney today.
The tour was organised by Pacific Blue Airline Australia and Tonga's Ministry of Tourism. In Tongatapu the group visited the island resorts of Fafa and Royal Sunset, as well as the Blow Holes and the Flying Foxes in western Tongatapu. In Vava'u they went whale watching - a highlight of their visit.
The group included four Tongans: Elizabeth Kupu and Neomi Afu, Travel Consultants; Sione Pinomi, TVB man in Australia; and a media representative, Penelope Hu'akau from Tonga Radio FM 2000. There were also three Samoans, representing Samoan Travel Agents.