The activities of travel agencies and tour operators have also influenced the
development of incoming and outgoing tourism. It is estimated that there are
about 400 travel agencies and tour operators in Slovakia. The majority of
them provide tourism services for outgoing tourists.
Slovakia is still an unknown country and an unknown tourism destination for many potential tourists, mainly from western European countries, the USA and Asian countries.
In 2004–2008 the co-financing of the marketing activities has been realised in the framework of the operational programme, ‘Industry and Services’, section 2.3 ‘Programme for the support of tourism promotion and creation of the National Tourism
Information System’. Due to this programme, more promotional activities have been supported, including the new tourism national web-portal, www.slovakiatravel.com, which was launched in 2007.
Another positive feature of tourism development is that there has up to now been no mass tourism; the majority of facilities are small and mediumsized businesses with a high share of domestic capital. About 70% of all hotels and hospitality facilities are small and are owned by locals. On the other hand, in the last 10 years the international hotel chains (Holiday Inn,
Sheraton, Carlton, Kempinski, etc.) have become part of the tourism business
in Slovakia.
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