Some of China’s travel agencies admit they have overestimated the number of domestic travelers for the Olympics.

Note carefully we are not talking of overseas visitors here.

Zhang Lei, a spokesman with the Shanghai-based Spring International Travel Service, said its Olympic tourist products had met with slack market response.

He said, ‘We have offered customers a dozen Olympic travel routes with prices ranging from RMB2,000 yuan ($293) to RMB7,000 per person. They have registered about 1,000 tourists for the past two months, which was 50% lower than our objective.’

Yin Jun, manager of the Jiangsu provincial branch of China Travel Service, attributed the low market mainly to the hefty travel cost to Beijing.

He said, ‘Travel from Jiangsu to the national capital costs about RMB2,000 per person in normal days, but our Olympic tourist products are priced above RMB6,000 on average.’

The manager said the price was driven by increased cost. THe price of a two-star hotel room went from RMB120 to RMB1,200  and the rental fee of a tourist bus tripled from the current RMB1,000 a day.

Sun Bing, the agency’s deputy general manager said, ‘Summer is China’s golden travel season. There are plenty of hot tourist destinations other than Beijing.’ (Our illustration is of a competing attraction. A hotel in Hainan.)
Source: China View