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The
Straits Times, 19 Jun 04
Insight: Will extreme makeover fix Sentosa's
image problem?
SENTOSA'S extreme makeover will be a thing to watch. Hopes are that,
along with the Southern Islands around it, the island Singaporeans
love to underestimate will emerge from its decade-long surgery to
much ooh-ing and aah-ing.
The sheer amount of money involved is already a talking point. Sentosa's
facelift and contouring will cost $6 billion, with additions of a
yachting marina, a rail artery from the HarbourFront area to the island,
as well as a $24 million water-and-laser show to play nightly in the
works.
Another $1 billion will go towards developing the Southern Islands,
where a white-sand beach, 170-room beachfront hotel, a 70-unit chalet
resort and a 290-room hilltop hotel are being planned. 'The mass planning
committee has already approved the three resorts and chalet,' revealed
Mrs Pamelia Lee, managing director of the Southern Islands Development.
'It could be ready for land sale very quickly, as land reclamation
there is already 98 per cent completed.'
Several accommodation groups, including Banyan Tree hotels and resorts,
have been invited to develop properties there, although nothing has
been confirmed.
The revised annual target for the islands after 2012, when work is
completed, is eight million visitors annually, to pump up the annual
revenue from its current $190 million to $900 million. But the bricks,
mortar and countless man-hours invested may not be enough.
Beneath this massive undertaking to reposition the islands lies a
deeper problem that money alone will not solve. Before it can be a
Singapore idol, it must face the harshest panel of judges: Singaporeans
themselves.
Industry insiders say it must overcome decades of prejudice among
deeply unimpressed citizens, some of whom possibly still associate
it with school excursions to see scary wax figures in the Surrender
Chamber. If more of them are seduced by Sentosa's appeal, then more
will take or recommend their foreign visitors to see the island.
As it is, travel agents and promoters interviewed say they would rather
show off the Night Safari, Chinatown, Little India, Boat Quay or Mohamed
Sultan before getting visitors to spend a day on Sentosa. The island
currently racks up more than four million tourist visits from locals
and foreigners annually, each group accounting for half the number.
Mr Darrell Metzger, chief executive of the Sentosa Leisure Group,
has had to deal with that conundrum when he was appointed to helm
developments. 'Half of the island was catering to locals and half
to tourists. So which two million people do you want to give up? The
answer is, you don't want to give up two million people, so you have
to continue to appeal to both markets.'
If developments were starting from scratch, marketing efforts could
be skewed towards either the foreign or local market. But, he points
out, 'it's too late'. 'When you have two million of each, they all
spend money.'
The most immediate and elegant solution was to woo Singaporeans because
'you can reach them quicker, you can give them nice beaches that they
will like and they will enjoy'. Rather than compete with Bali or Phuket,
his mission was to attract Singaporeans first, then their visitors.
Sentosa's attractions would then tempt them to extend their stays.
'Sentosa is not like Bali, we're not intending it to be that way,
and we're not selling it that way,' he said. 'We will become the second
destination. We offer the option for families to stay on the island,
and whoever has business is 15 minutes away from Suntec or the business
district.'
Mr Metzger can also say, with conviction, that theme-park roller-coasters
and parades of life-sized cartoon characters can go only so far. He
should know. In his past, he played a key role setting up Tokyo Disneyland,
and witnessed first-hand the fierce criticism of Euro Disneyland during
that tenure.
He was also chief executive officer of both Hawaii's Atlantis Adventures
and Hong Kong's Ocean Park - water parks that did not quite spout
success. They have given him invaluable experience that now puts him
in the perfect position to say this: 'Last year, we had 4.2 million
visitors here - and that's with Sars - they spent $200 million on
this island. What other resorts can you tell me would consider that
a failure?'
Nonetheless, he realises there is a crusade ahead: 'We have an image
problem that we have to overcome. The image was that there wasn't
much to do. A lot of people were here in the early 1990s, and they
haven't been back! 'We have to get them back first. We can't just
change the image through advertising and marketing. Our image was
that we were expensive, so we lowered our prices. Our image was that
we were inaccessible, so we dealt with that by allowing drive-in traffic
with only $2 parking... it's tougher to change an image than to create
a new image.'
Perhaps, Sentosa's repositioning isn't a marketing issue but a geographical
one after all - it needs to move out of Singaporeans' heads and into
their hearts. |
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