By V. Sivaji
The Malaysian Association of Hotels (Penang Chapter) together with Penang Global Tourism (PGT) has come up with the “Penang-Lang” promotion campaign to draw locals and tourists to patronize hotels here.
This is in view of the loss in business among hotels in terms of room bookings and meetings, incentives, conventions and exhibitions (MICE) sector.
Penang MAH chairman, Khoo Boo Lim when outlining the campaign said that some 6,000 room nights has been lost due to the COVID-19 outbreak from China.
“The tourism campaign will be divided into two sections, first is to cater for foreign tourists and the second to domestic travelers.
“All stakeholders in the tour and travel, hotels and other tourism product related operators are urged to come up with attractive discount packages to cater for locals and tourists.
“The hotels here have lost almost RM3 million in Penang after a string of cancellations,” said Khoo.
Local residents especially with local identity card addresses will be entitled to enjoy great discounts at hotels and restaurants here.
He also added that some hotels have resorted to asking their staff to stay home, while some were also encouraging their workers to take leave following a drop in hotel occupancy.