More than 60,000 additional visitors are expected to touch down in Grand Bahama each year due to rising airlift from Bahamasair.
Bridgette King, director of sales at the Bahamas Tourism Office (BTO) in Florida told Guardian Business that four new mid-Atlantic gateways are on schedule to come online next month, translating into thousands of seats for Grand Bahama.
"Bahamasair is taking over Vision Airlines flights from Raleigh, Baltimore, Louisville and Richmond. On an annual basis, this could bring up to 62,400 seats into Grand Bahama. These flights translate into 1,200 seats per week from the four gateways," according to King.
"That service is going to be discontinued by Vision Airlines, so we at the Ministry of Tourism and Aviation worked along with Bahamasair to take it over so that there would be no disruption in service."
The flights originating out of Baltimore and Louisville arrive and depart on Thursdays and Sundays, while those flights out of Raleigh/Durham and Richmond arrive and depart on Fridays and Mondays.
King said her team is confident that this newest service will be successful as all of the major online travel agents and traditional tour operators are already selling seats.
Last month, BTO employees went on sales missions to each of those four gateways.
She further noted that quite a hefty sum was paid to promote these new flights through various media including online, digital, radio and television. However, she remained tight-lipped as to exactly how much was spent.
One of those promotional avenues undertaken by the BTO was the modification made to Bahamasair's website.
"We've worked with Bahamasair to refresh [the] Bahamasair.com website, as this is the call to action in our TV and online advertising in those markets. Once the customer clicks for details, they are linked to a special landing page to get information on the service, the hotel details and up to a $400 instant air credit," King explained.
She admits that tapping into these mid-Atlantic markets is new for Bahamasair, but feels that the national flag carrier and Grand Bahama will benefit tremendously from this newest service.
"These markets used to be very popular with Laker Airlines back in the 1990s and ever since then, we've noticed a major void and now with Bahamasair now going into these major cities, The Bahamas will once again be able to benefit."
The new routes come into effect on May 17 from Baltimore and May 18 from Richmond/Raleigh and Durham.

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