Cover Story
Promoting 'America in Asia'
Guam's Airport Authority Beats
The recently completed, $260 million Guam International Airport is a showpiece in Guam’s attempt to crank up the volume of its tourist trade, using its “America in Asia” hook to draw in visitors from both east and west. But the design of the upscale facility — that molds the past with the present, using high ceiling beams that represent the flying proa-boat that was used to navigate throughout Micronesian waters — isn’t the only innovative aspect of the airport operation: unique in Micronesia, Guam’s International Airport Authority operates a high-profile promotion campaign aimed at luring visitors to this western-most outpost for the American flag.
An estimated 1.4 million visitors will transit through the massive steel and glass structure this year, bringing with them money to spend on tours, hotel accommodations, golfing, scuba diving and a growing number of unique attractions, says Guam Visitors Bureau General Manager James Nelson.
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So what has the Guam International Airport added to this building of this world-class array of fun and activities that only a few years ago was limited to a ride around a 30 mile long island, enriched with WWII history?
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GIAA’s aggressive marketing of Guam, combined with the efforts of the Guam Visitors Bureau, is attracting conventions such as the 12th Japan Congress and International Travel and Trade Show, which brought people from 70 countries, and a future convention of the U.S. National Association of State Aviation Officials. “Our community relies on the tourism industry and although we have been hurt badly because of the Asian economic collapse of major countries, Guam is still America, and our Japanese friends wish to enjoy the amenities that America in Asia has to offer,” says Governor Carl T.C. Gutierrez.
At a time when government revenues are down and the economic outlook continues to look bleak, GIAA has maintained a healthy position financially, General Manager Gerald Yingling says. There are many reasons for GIAA’s success during austere times, Yingling contends. “The working relationship between the board of directors and the staff and management of the airport has led to rethinking and restructuring fees and services that we offer to our clients so that as a team we provide the best for our visitors who in reality are our lifeline industry.”
Two years ago, with continuing fallout from the Asian financial crisis keeping visitor levels well below their mid-1990s levels, and major airlines cutting back flights left and right, GIAA slashed its landing and related fees to airlines — it was a move that initially brought Yingling criticism, but has proved effective in the long run in enticing airlines to add flights into Guam, a development that other, less traveled Micronesian destinations might note. Reduced fees increased Guam’s attractiveness to international carriers, which in turn increased available seat capacity. Both Dias and Yingling agree that the lowering of per passenger tariff rates in the past two years has increased airport and airline activity in Guam.
Its ability to draw in airlines, increase the visitor count, hook conventions and put its best foot forward with arriving passengers greeted by the sleek new airport may be the least of Guam’s worries at the moment. Possibly the greatest impediment to building its visitor industry — that both Gutierrez and local businesses are clearly anxious to do — is the woeful condition and management of its key infrastructure that, since earlier this year, has seen front page photos in Pacific Daily News of tourists having to step around raw sewage pouring out onto the sidewalks in the Tumon Bay strip, Guam’s version of Waikiki beach. Once it gets a grip on its power, water and sewage systems, Guam will have a package that will live up to its marketing motto, “America in Asia.”
