HK Disneyland targets young Thais with promise of ‘sanook’
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Hong Kong Disneyland Resort is using the Thai love of fun, or ‘sanook’, to attract more young visitors to the park.
The theme park arrived in Thailand last week to showcase its new attractions, the ‘Paint the Night Parade’, which launched in October, and ‘Frozen Christmas’ which gets underway this month.
And speaking to Travel Daily at the travel trade launch event in Bangkok, Hong Kong Disneyland’s director of travel trade sales, Larry Leung, said that these events form the latest part of a major campaign, ‘100 Choices of Fun’, that focuses on several key elements of the resort.
“We understand that what Thais love is fun. Everything in Thailand is fun! So when we were thinking about how we promote ourselves, we didn’t think it would be enough just to talk about the attraction. That’s why we initiated, ‘100 Choices of Fun’, to let [Thai visitors] know there are a lot of things they can do,” said Leung.
Focusing on four key elements, ‘Play, Dine, Snap and Shop’, 100 Choices of Fun is designed to appeal to Thai travellers’ love of fun, food, photo-taking and shopping. It has also tied up with a Thai website, appropriately called sanook.com, to promote packages to the park.
And according Leung, this next phase will aim to promote the “ultimate fun”. Hong Kong Disneyland has brought in two Thai celebrities – Chompoo Araya A. Hargate and Cris Horwang – to better target the Thai market.
“With our new product launch and the run-up to Christmas – and we know that Thais love spending Christmas overseas – we invited two top Thai celebrities, Chompoo and Cris, to be our ambassadors. So we’re building the fun, talking about the fun, and then bringing it to another level, and promoting products in order to stimulate interest in the Thai market,” he added.
And interestingly, it’s not only the Thai family market that Hong Kong Disneyland is seeking to attract.
“[We know that Hong Kong Disneyland is a] must-visit destination for families with kids,” said Leung. “But there are also a big number of young adults visiting Hong Kong for shopping, looking for fun and food. So this is also one of our main [areas of] focus. It’s only two and a half hour flight [from Bangkok] to Hong Kong. In the coming few years we will be trying to penetrate this young adult market.”
Leung went on to explain that these young adults are typically “twenty-somethings with no kids, university students or graduates.” “When they think of travel outbound from Thailand, we want to be the first thing that comes into their mind,” he added.
“We have observed a lot of similarities between Thailand and Hong Kong, especially the interests of Thai people. First they are very internet savvy. They go online and search for information, and they really love exploring different cultures, especially the food,” Leung stated.
“Considering all the factors, we think that Thailand should be among our highest priorities. So we picked Thailand as the first place to launch our ‘Disney Paint the Night’ and ‘Frozen Christmas’ to the trade and media. Of course we’re looking to other countries, but Thailand is our first stop.”
And with the number of Thai visitors to Hong Kong Disneyland having jumped 51% over the past five years, the strategy appears to be working.
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