From next June until September of this year, the island will once again be connected to Portugal, with a weekly direct flight from Porto and Lisbon. Consolidating this air connection for the summer season and improving Lanzarote's positioning as a tourist destination in the Spanish market will be the main objectives of the collaboration agreement signed this Thursday between Turismo Lanzarote and the Tour Operator Soltour, one of the main wholesalers in Spain, belonging to the Piñero Group.
Thanks to this agreement, the Lanzarote tourist product will be made known throughout the distribution and sales network of the wholesaler's vacation packages, with two strong promotional campaigns that will have a presence in both issuing markets, under the modality of 'co-branding' or 'brand association'.
During the signing of the promotional agreement, the president of the Cabildo of Lanzarote, Pedro San Ginés, stated that "the signing of this agreement with this large tour operator for the recovery of the national market, while promoting these emerging direct flights with Portugal, through the cities of Lisbon and Porto, is fundamental and almost an obligation for Lanzarote."
Pedro San Ginés detailed that "this is a framework agreement by which the Cabildo of Lanzarote will contribute some 35,000 euros to collaborate with Soltour in the promotion of the island in the Iberian Peninsula."
For his part, the general director of Soltour, Javier Castillo, highlighted that the tour operator has been "operating in Spain for more than thirty years and more than twenty-two in Portugal." Through this framework agreement, the wholesaler intends to "consolidate these two direct flights from Porto and Lisbon to Lanzarote for the summer season and even be able to increase the weekly frequency of flights." The general director also reported that the "business expectations for the next summer season are good." As an indicator of these prospects, he advanced that they have a forecast and advance in sales of 30% above what they had last year with respect to the same period.
With this campaign in Portugal, Lanzarote will be present in the 300 travel agencies with which this operator works and in Spain they intend to bet equally on the island through the promotional network and travel agencies with which this wholesale agent of the Piñero Group operates, a leader in the hotel tourism sector, which works primarily with vacation packages aimed at family and couples tourism.
In this act, the president of the Cabildo and the general director of Soltour were accompanied by the managing director and CEO of the Sociedad de Promoción Exterior (SPEL), Héctor Fernández Manchado, and the contracting director of the tour operator, Ana Valenzuela. Among other attendees, there were councilors of Tourism from several municipalities and members of the Asolan employers' association, as representatives also of the Sociedad de Promoción Exterior de Lanzarote.