The Fort Lauderdale-based newspaper, South Florida Sun-Sentinel reports that Americans are making the Dominican Republic their No. 1 vacation spot. Reporter Doreen Hemlock explains the destination got its latest marketing boost when tycoon Donald Trump signed a US$1 billion-plus resort and residential development on the East Coast and chose the glamorous winner of The Apprentice, California lawyer Stefani Schaeffer to direct the operations. The report in the business section of the Sun-Sentinel explains that “Trump’s entry at the sprawling Cap Cana project underscores a recent shift to more upscale offerings, geared more to U.S. visitors with less time and more buying power.” She was referring to the US market grabbing a greater share of room nights from traditional tourists from Canada, Europe and South America that would easily stay two weeks straight.
“The Dominican Republic has truly gone through a transformation,” said Scott Berman, who leads hospitality consulting for PriceWaterhouseCoopers in Miami. “The rest of the Caribbean became so expensive from a land perspective that the Dominican Republic was in a class by itself.”
Travel agents in the US are bullish on the DR, says the Sun-Sentinel. “Alan Treff, owner of travel agency Happy Trails Travel of Boca Raton, said he has seen a surge in his business to the Dominican Republic in the past year or so, especially to the more upscale all-inclusive resorts with golf such as Casa de Campo on the south coast. He visited this spring and found the nation “has come quite a way.”
And the resorts are getting good reviews, too, from the American traveler. “Lawyer Carol Ferrero, of Plantation, recently vacationed with her family at La Romana at a Spanish-owned, all-inclusive chain named Iberostar. With its wide range of activities, including theater performances that her daughter eagerly joined in, Ferrero said she’d “go back in one minute.”
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/realestate/…