ABTA appoints new director of tourism for the Caribbean & Latin America

The Antigua and Barbuda Tourism Authority (ABTA) is pleased to announce the appointment of Charmaine Browne-Spencer, as Director of Tourism for the Caribbean and Latin America.

In her new role as Director of Tourism for the Caribbean and Latin America, Spencer’s key responsibilities will include growing market share and destination arrivals from these regions. She will also focus on strengthening strategic partnerships with regional stakeholders, building airlift capacity into the destination, and continuing to improve the destination’s PR and brand awareness within these emerging markets.

Spencer brings a wealth of experience to the role with over 10 years of experience working in the tourism industry. She previously served as Marketing Consultant to the Antigua and Barbuda Tourism Authority for the Caribbean and Latin American markets, where she led efforts to enhance connectivity with the introduction of regional airlines and the re-introduction of ferry charters to the destination. In her role she strengthened relationships with regional entities, such as Cricket West Indies and local Creative Industries.

Spencer introduced regional travel trade training programmes, and increased brand awareness through multiple PR and advertising initiatives growing the destination’s market share across key target markets. In 2019, Spencer improved year-on-year arrivals from the Caribbean region by 23%, producing the best summer figures on record from the market, and positioning it as the destination’s third largest source market, with the current market performance up 200% over 2021 figures.

A former Marketing Manager for the Antigua and Barbuda Tourism Authority, Spencer brought her expertise in branding, advertising, and strategic promotions, to significantly enhance the entity’s destination marketing and has contributed greatly to building up the Antigua and Barbuda destination brand. She conceptualized and successfully executed numerous stand-out destination marketing campaigns such as #LoveAntiguaBarbuda and assisted in steering the creation of the recent Your Space in the Sun campaign, during the pandemic.

The new appointment compliments ABTA’s strategic objective to expand its brand presence in emerging markets. This is especially true for the neighbouring Caribbean and Latin America markets, which have combined populations of over half a billion people, which presents a powerful potential opportunity for Antigua and Barbuda. Post pandemic research shows a demand for high-end tourism and new destinations for Latin American travellers, which offers greater possibilities to extract more visitors from this market.

Spencer said: “I am delighted to be given the opportunity to serve in the new role of ABTA Director of Tourism, for the Caribbean and Latin America. With such close proximity to these regions there is definite growth potential that exists from these markets, along with increased opportunities for business partnerships, and networking in tourism, trade, and investment.  I would like to thank the ABTA Board and wider team for seeing the benefits in connecting and strengthening our regional and South American networks and I look forward to taking Antigua and Barbuda tourism to greater heights.”

Antigua and Barbuda Tourism Authority’s CEO Colin C. James said: “As our organization continues to adapt to meet the demands of the competitive tourism industry, we are delighted that we can harness the skills and talents of those on our team in newer roles.  We welcome Charmaine into this position and look forward to working with her for the further development of tourism in Antigua and Barbuda.”