Is my love affair with Aruba coming to an end?

[Arawak]

I'm not sure what is so odd about this or why specific travelers should feel discriminated. Attracting high value, low impact tourism has been the emphasis for years now. Aruba does not have the physical space for mass tourism and we have already surpassed the limit the island can realistically take. The marketing strategy thus changes so in the medium/long term the physical numbers don't need to keep increasing, but stays the same or reduces while the income is not lost or increases. The amount of tourists that come here blows all other destinations out the water on a per capita basis. I don't think people quite understand just how much tourism Aruba gets for its size.

Its not something that changes overnight. Addition of Ritz Carlton, St Regis among others for example fit into this strategy. It dsn't mean that the government is going to look how much people earn nor are they going to price out people that are coming now. The government does not control room or flight prices. However, the aim is to increase the average income of the average traveler. This is done by the marketing strategy over time, not any type of regulation or price controls.

Aruba is already not a cheap destination and it hasn't been. Its no Mexico, DR, Jamaica, PR or most other regional countries. An equal trip to one of these destinations is far cheaper than in Aruba, so that prices many people out and has for a long time already. At the same time, Aruba is no St Barts which is on the other side of the scale. Aruba wants to be closer to St Barts on the scale and not fall towards the DR, Mexico side of the scale.

[Pegmeister]

Arawak, I respect and appreciate your thoughts. As I said in my post, it makes sense that Aruba would want to attract a more affluent tourist. There are good reasons for a strategy that would help to reduce the volume of tourists as the infrastructure of the island IMHO can’t handle an increased influx of people. For me though, I found the words “with an annual income of $150,000” to be off putting. It makes me feel that all the tourists that travelled to the island during the pandemic and helped support the economy were not appreciated.

[kimmy1956]

I find this very disheartening. It is not cheap going to Aruba. There are several places that are as nice, if not nicer than Aruba. This would most definitely impact my next trip. We all work hard for our income. I do know that I would not gamble again in Aruba. This answered many questions I wondered about.

[act1966]

Where was the article published?

https://www.government.aw/news/news_...ase_60839.html

[Pegmeister]

https://www.government.aw/news/news_...ase_60839.html

Thanks for the link Stephen.

[Aruba4ever]

They certainly have been trying to boost their tourism dollars by offering higher end properties as mentioned. That said I think Aruba has made its money on the backs of hard working people that save as much as possible to visit at least 1x per year. I don't think adding high end properties and looking for the "average" visitor to make 150k is going to fill their hotels up but what do I know. Advertising your 150k wish is certainly insulting many of their most loyal visitors.

[Andrea J.]

$150 k is commonplace for working couples with 2 or more kids.
Or married no kids.
Not so much for many of us retired folks.

Add to it the world wide economy in the bowels of Hell.

[Arawak]

It makes me feel that all the tourists that travelled to the island during the pandemic and helped support the economy were not appreciated.

I don't think this has anything to do with tourists that came during the pandemic. Tourists coming to the island for many years regularly get acknowledged and rewarded with plaques, appear in the papers etc. The government repeated how grateful it was quite often during press conferences in 2020 and 2021.

Wanting to attract and maintain a type of tourist that spends more on average has been the goal of Aruba tourism for a while. The more mass tourism you have, the more the island gets dragged down to the detriment of locals and it's flora and fauna. So with Aruban tourism exploding so much by the numbers, they must put a stop to that somehow. You either put a cap on arrivals or you try to boost tourism spend in the long term. The whole reason Aruba markets so heavily in the NE United States is specifically because they spend more on average than most other tourists. Same reason the island focused so much on Venezuela back in the 90's. It's also why the island dsn't put much focus on the Netherlands because Dutch people are not big spenders on average, making the return on your investment less. Being a small island means you have limited resources, so where and importantly how you spend that budget is critical.

The strategy isn't "Aruba aims to only accept tourists that earn 150k and above" starting tomorrow". It's a long term strategy to stop the continually increasing tourism numbers, but still maintaining the income and quality of life Arubans are used to. No tourists are getting denied, priced out or underappreciated. The government is just looking out for the future both for current visitors and locals. Because if this isn't done, the damages won't be fixable; we are already at the edge of what is feasible.

I've said this before on here, but it's the same reason why I assume that buying a home here will become very restricted or impossible in the future for non-residents. There is not enough land even for locals to live on, yet it's become a sport to sell land to people from abroad, driving up land prices and making it unaffordable for Arubans to live in their own country. Same logic here too. People who have already bought a house won't be affected and it's not an attack towards them. It's just basic policy making to ensure the islands' survivability for future generations.

[Pegmeister]

Arawak, I completely understand what you are saying and I can’t say that I totally disagree. I can only say how using a dollar amount to describe the type of tourist Aruba would like to attract, feels offensive to me. Better to say that the government would like to see more resorts with luxury amenities like the Ritz. It serves the same purpose without putting a dollar sign on a tourists head.

[Aruba4ever]

Agreed, its the delivery of the message- not the idea behind the message.

Arawak, I completely understand what you are saying and I can’t say that I totally disagree. I can only say how using a dollar amount to describe the type of tourist Aruba would like to attract, feels offensive to me. Better to say that the government would like to see more resorts with luxury amenities like the Ritz. It serves the same purpose without putting a dollar sign on a tourists head.