TokyoTomo Travel Guide

In a government’s move to spotlight medical tours to Japan as is seen in an effort to set up “a panel to study inbound medical tours,” Nippon Travel Agency (NTA) takes a lead in this field with success. Shiro Aoki, deputy general manager of International Sales for Asia & Oceania at NTA, said the agency had marketed a PET (positron-emission tomography)-monitored medical examination tour to wealthy people in China to help detect early cancer. The applicants for this year have already outnumbered those in the previous year.

NTA formed a partnership with China-based travel agency L’avion International for this project in April 2008. L’avion pioneered sale of medical tours in the Chinese market targeting well-to-do people and has organized in the past anti-aging tours to Switzerland. NTA collaborates with Seijukai OCAT Clinic as the receiving medical institution in Japan. L’avion made it primary conditions for the partnership to provide the highest level of medical examination to the travelers, and the Clinic has been proved qualified in this regard.

The clinic started to take in tour applicants in April 2009 and they totaled nearly 40 by the end of that year, and they already number 46 from January to May this year. In the meantime, presentation meetings of this tour were held in Beijing and Shanghai in early April for L’avion customers and 110 people are reported to have assembled in total on these two occasions. Aoki has this to say: “Our initial yearly goal was 100 people, but we now plan to revise it upward, maybe to 150.” He is willing to organize different types of tour other than the PET-scanning tour to tap the market. The fields of such healthcare would be those in which Japan dominates in the world and Japanese medical institutions welcome foreign patients. They would be, for example, in the fields of cosmetic surgery and natural hair transplantation.

NTA is considering capturing market demand other than China, possibly such big markets as Europe and Korea from which the agency receive many travelers in the framework of business. In starting the business in those markets, NTA recognizes that, since different approaches from the leisure markets are required, close relationship with the counterparts is critical. Meanwhile, it claims that a special visa for medical examination and treatment should be introduced institutionally to promote this type of business.

It is said that many of Chinese applicants are either proprietors or owners of businesses and are aged between 40 and 60. Their itineraries vary as they are custom-made, with the one-night-two-day core event of PET scanning examination incorporated. A four-day or five-day tour appears to be popular, and average tour price is approximately one million yen.

Source: Travel Vision

Travel Vision Inc. provides information on the travel industry in Japan via "Daily Travel Vision", a Japanese-language e-mail newsletter, and the "Travel Vision" website. There are nearly 110,000 people working in the Japanese travel industry, and Travel Vision is proud to be bringing travel news to more than 30,000 people through Daily Travel Vision.

Nippon Travel Agency (NTA) intends to expand MICE business to 27 billion yen’s worth in 2010 and to boost its proportion to nearly 30 percent in the agency’s group travel handling. NTA set up MICE Department on March 1 last year but, due to the outbreak of H1N1 influenza and economic recession, the share of MICE-related business remained at 27 percent of the group travel in 2009. Takahisa Ishigaki, general manager of MICE Department at Sales & Marketing Headquarters, says, “The year 2010 started at about the same pace as in previous year.” With human resource development of young and middle-aged staff in view and with introduction of new systems implemented, he is eager not only to undertake site operations but to organize the whole course of events by gaining credibility from the clients.

With relation to staff’s education, a training session was given to them in which everyone’s way of presentation was recorded in video to review his own manner and improve recessary skills and attitudes. It started with senior staff because they are required of being a role model in the training. The agency distributed to each member of the sales staff a MICE sales guide that contains data analysis and tips on operational methods. An upgraded manual is also being prepared. Moreover, an internal qualification system was put in place to test and accredit a competent staff as an “event operation manager” in a bid to change the staff’s mind from a travel agent to an event promoter or supervisor. NTA plans to allocate 10 qualified staff to each of five regional headquarters across the country and to two regional companies. The MICE Department is to render assistance for such staffing and extend financial support for the necessary training.

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Total travel revenue at Nippon Travel Agency (NTA) was 24,099 million yen in February, down 4.9 percent from last year. While domestic travel sales were 15,852 million yen, down 8.7 percent, overseas travel was up 3.7 percent to 7,958 million yen with good performance of package tours and individual travel.

In overseas travel, group tours plunged 24.8 percent to 944 million yen as both ordinary groups and educational groups lost more than 20 percent. Sales of package tours of NTA’s own operation – Mach and Best Tour – rose 7.8 percent to 3,683 million yen while handling of other agencies’ tours dropped 25.1 percent to 748 million yen. Individual travel surged 45.6 percent to 2,290 million yen.

In domestic travel, group tours were down 4.0 percent to 3,027 million yen, package tours slid 4.5 percent to 5,657 million yen, and individual travel dipped 13.4 percent to 7,167 million yen. Inbound travel lost 12.3 percent to 275 million yen.

Source: Travel Vision

Travel Vision Inc. provides information on the travel industry in Japan via "Daily Travel Vision", a Japanese-language e-mail newsletter, and the "Travel Vision" website. There are nearly 110,000 people working in the Japanese travel industry, and Travel Vision is proud to be bringing travel news to more than 30,000 people through Daily Travel Vision.