Costa, Europe’s Number One Cruise Line, is showing travel agents the love with a “So Much More Amore” promotion throughout April that features daily and weekly prizes as well as a grand prize giveaway to attend Costa’s double inaugural in June. For every FIT Europe or Exotic 2009 cruise booking made between April 1 and 30 agents will automatically become eligible for twice daily $100 Italian-themed giveaways and weekly Caribbean cruise giveaways, complete with onboard credits. An incredible grand prize giveaway features one trip for two to Genoa, Italy to attend the dual naming ceremony of the Costa Luminosa and Costa Pacifica on June 5.
The “So Much More Amore Promotion” is open to FIT travel agent partners, excluding call centers, just for booking and depositing FIT Europe and Exotic 2009 sailings. The more cabins travel agents book, the better chance they have to win. A grand prize winner will be announced on or around May 6, 2009. This exciting grand prize is one trip for two to Genoa, Italy to attend the dual naming ceremony of the Costa Luminosa and Costa Pacifica, including five-nights of accommodations aboard the Costa Pacifica, transfers and roundtrip economy airfare.
“We understand how hard our travel agent partners are working right now and wanted to find a fun, exciting way to reward them for booking our European and Exotic programs,” said Scott Knutson, vice president of sales for Costa North America. “There really is ‘so much more amore’ in the promotion with daily giveways, weekly cruise giveaways and a grand prize giveaway to a once-in-a-lifetime experience, our dual inaugural.”
Each week during the four week contest, two winners will receive a seven-night Costa Caribbean cruise for two, plus a $200 onboard credit. Two travel agents will be chosen daily from Monday through Saturday to win from a menu of prizes including $100 gift Italian-themed gift cards.
Travel agents who are C.O.S.T.A (Costa Online Sales Training Academy) graduates will earn two automatic entries for each passenger booked and deposited, doubling their chances for winning grand prize and weekly prizes as well as earning an additional 3% of commission for the first year of their graduation.
Costa Cruises is Italy and Europe’s number one cruise line. For the past 60 years its ships have sailed the world, offering the best in Italian style, hospitality and cuisine and providing dream vacations with the best in fun and relaxation. In 2007 over 1.1 million guests chose to cruise with Costa, a record for the European cruise industry. The company’s 12 fleet members, each with her own distinctive characteristics and unique style, all fly the Italian flag and sail each year to 250 destinations in the Mediterranean, Northern Europe, the Baltic Sea, the Caribbean, South America, the United Arab Emirates, the Far East and the Indian Ocean.
Two more new ships – the Costa Luminosa and Costa Pacifica – are due for delivery at the end of April and the end of May 2009, and will be christened together in Genoa, Italy on June 5 this year. Three additional ships are on order. Costa Cruises has been certified by RINA (Italian Shipping Register) with the BEST4, an integrated system of voluntary certification of corporate compliance with the highest standards governing social accountability (SA 8000, issued in 2001), environment (UNI EN ISO 14001, 2004), safety (OHSAS 18001, 1999) and quality (UNI EN ISO 9001, 2000). All ships in the Costa fleet have been assigned RINA’s Green Star notation certifying that they are operated in compliance with the highest environmental protection standards. Costa Cruises is an official partner of the WWF for the protection of the marine ecoregions of the Mediterranean, the Greater Antilles and Brazil. In Mediobanca’s 2008 survey of over 3,700 Italian enterprises that recorded revenue of at least 50 million euros the previous fiscal year, Costa Crociere S.p.A. ranks 72nd in terms of sales and in 12th place in regards to profitability.
