With Thailand scheduled to reopen to vaccinated foreign tourists next week, SET-listed marketing event service Index Creative Village Plc expects two billion baht to be circulated in the country's event organising industry over the next two months.
Kriengkarn Kanjanapokin, the company's co-founder and co-chief executive, said that since the government eased its lockdown measures and scheduled the reopening of the country for Nov 1, overall consumer sentiment has improved a lot, while companies in several sectors including retail and tourism have prepared their marketing events for the upcoming festive season, which is the peak season for sales.
However, the events to be organised are unlikely to be at full scale, as seen prior to the pandemic, because big corporations remain cautious and are worried such events might result in fresh Covid-19 clusters, which would destroy or damage their corporate image.
In addition, Mr Kriengkarn said the format of events such as the Loy Krathong festival or the annual festive retail season is also unlikely to be the same as in the pre-pandemic years.
"Last year, the 14-billion-baht event organising business was hit hard by the Covid-19 outbreaks, but this year the industry is even harder hit. With almost two years of the pandemic, we have learned that what is certain is uncertain. Therefore, we have to rely on ourselves and expand our own events rather than focusing on managing and arranging event organising for corporate companies," Mr Kriengkarn said, adding that the event organising business is also unlikely to become active enough, even though the country is reopening.
Mr Kriengkarn said that after the country reopens, foreign tourists are not expected to rush back to Thailand, while he expects it will take 2-3 years for Thailand's tourism business to fully recover.
"We're now focusing mainly on our own events," he said. "Moreover, we are considering extending our business to food, which is considered a big market as people consume every day."
With the success of House Illumination at CentralWorld, the company is now in cooperation with Kirimaya Co, the operator of Kirimaya hotel and resort, to showcase "Forest of Illumination", a festival of lights for visitors to Kirimaya Khao Yai Resort in Nakhon Ratchasima.
The festival runs from Nov 5 until Jan 29, 2022. The price of a ticket is 300 baht, with free entry for children under 90 centimetres in height.
The festival marks the first time high-tech multimedia technology has been combined with nature, allowing visitors to broaden their senses all the way through their journey in the forest that has never been open to visitors before.
"We hope the show will build confidence and boost the tourism industry in Khao Yai," Mr Kriengkarn said.
The show is expected to economically boost the surrounding area by around one billion baht during the 86-day light festival.
Mr Kriengkarn said that ticket bookings for the show had got off to a good start, with 60,000 visitors expected, mainly from Bangkok.
The company expects its total sales to reach 669 million baht this year, up from more than 400 million baht last year.