I’m sure if Bermuda had any say in pricing of flights. That, I believe is the airline, with the exception of airport fees and the like. The less people who travel here the more prices will increase and those who do travel to or from Bermuda will have to foot the bill I guess.

American Airlines Pricing:
Bermuda to Miami $648 3hr flight
Trinidad to Miami $247 4hr flight
Barbados to Miami $602 4hr flight
Montego Bay to Miami $225 2hr flight

Why is the Bermuda flight more expensive, and we travel a shorter distance? If the costs were cheaper, I’m sure more people would travel. Most Bermudians do the majority of their shopping overseas since we lack the worlds biggest brands and shops here and just about everything else the rest of the developed world has.

- All-inclusive hotels
- Proper transportation (not these death trap rentals)
- Lack of Entertainment and Nightlife (Night Clubs end at 3:00am! What a Joke)
- Competitive Hotel Pricing (No moderate to inexpensive hotels)
- Competitive Airline Ticket Pricing
- Relaxed laws
- Lack of tourist attractions and big events and expos etc.
- Our Beaches are bare with no Beach Bars/Restaurants
- City of Hamilton has no Entertainment/Tourist District
- No Casino’s, not even Crown & Anchor on Harbour Nights
- What happened to the submarine that we had in Dockyard?

We cant’ even advertise Bermuda properly. When is the last time you have seen a commercial or TV show about Bermuda on TV?

And you think throwing more money at something will fix it? You’ve missed the whole reason why people choose other destinations over Bermuda.

First will be the cost. How can Bermuda compete when hotel operating costs are so high? A cuban hotel GM gets paid less than a chambermaid here. People who have been rave about the friendlyness & SERVICE. Cuba has beaches as good as anywhere else in the area.

Americans will flock there out of curiosity. Cuba is a treasure trove of old US cars. Restorers, collectors & dealer will go in droves looking to buy old cars. From the SE Cuba is a much easier place to get to.

Bermuda needs to wake up from its very long slumber. This is not the 60s or 70s when Bermuda wrote the book on successful tourism. Our arrogance towards tourism has about killed the goose that laid that golden egg.

Now we have CUBA open for business again.

Some, a very few, have been warning of Cuba opening again for many many years. It was very very obvious with the fall of the Soviet Union. Just a question of time.

Warnings were ignored.

Yes, Cuba will be a large draw initially. I wish them success. But, like anything else, the curve will flatten eventually once enough people have gone to see what it all about. Bermuda’s tourism woes are not dependent on Cuba. There are enough tourists to go around.

We need to:

build new hotels, they attract tourists.

Improve our service to our guests, it is generally mediocre to bad.

Improve on island offerings and attractions. It can be so boring here.

Get the pricing under control. It shouldn’t cost twice as much to get to Bermuda than other Caribbean destinations.

And lastly, Compete ! Somewhere along the way, we forgot what it means and looks like to compete.

You want tourists? You have to compete for them.

The sky is not falling. The landscape is changing.

Never give up, just focus!

Bye Bermuda…. BTA/OBA/PLP won’t help. We are still building hotels to target the wrong market. Our tourism numbers keep declining. The ship is sinking, and we are all spectators of our own demise.

That said, I did laugh when I saw Obama bumper stickers in Bermuda in the last US election. Clearly all about black people identifying with a black world leader, and yet Obama’s acceptance globally was the very reverse.

Bermuda jumping on race not policies and people once again….sighs….

Our business product is not. Listen please OBA.

Surely there can’t be a govt subsidy?

But lets meet back here in 2018 and see how things have gone at that point.

Because believe it or not there are people who have no desire to go to Cuba.

Driven by Cuba’s opening up, Bermuda’s ‘market share’ will reduce again. Bermuda’s tourist air arrivals are still steadily falling and given the small size Bermuda’s tourist business is grealy affected by small changes

The bad news is it doesn’t look like there’ll be any bonuses for the BTA staff for a while .