Inside Asian Gaming

INSIDE ASIAN GAMING | March 2013 28 INSIGHTS “Shopping is a key attraction with regards to mainland China. It’s that accessibility, that duty-free component, and the drawing card that they can get genuine or international brands cheaper than they can get them in China.” drawing card that they can get genuine or international brands cheaper than they can get them in China. And that’s been one of the success factors for Hong Kong, and Macau is replicating that. One of the great, unique things that we actually have is heritage. Some people look at it as a positive, others say, ‘Yeah, so what?’ because Macau has a stigma of being so gaming-oriented. But part of our role working with the Macau Government Tourist Office is to present why Macau is so different. It is the most European city in the whole of Asia. It has a unique blend, a story that can be told with the Portuguese heritage and the Chinese heritage. And we actually spend a lot of time with the MGTO marketing that position, along with shopping. When our teams go out on the road internationally, if they’re in a marketing/sales appointment, they’d probably spend 50% of the time selling Macau as a diversified destination. And then in Hong Kong and Guangdong province in particular, Macau is famous for food. So that then becomes a key message within parts of China and Hong Kong and Taiwan as well. Hong Kong is already well-established as a center for exhibitions and conventions, with many companies based there. Does that make it difficult for Macau to compete? There are pros and cons to that. The pro to that is, actually, Hong Kong has limited capacity. Its ability to grow is limited. The Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre is just a convention center, there are no hotels connected to it. There’s the nearby Hyatt and Renaissance, but they don’t cater to the demand that is actually The first step towards delivering on the convention promise was providing 100,000 square meters of MICE [meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions] space at The Venetian Macao, which opened in August 2007.