Vietnam Airlines Lures Potential Customers via Golf Tournaments

The Northern Regional Office is the representative office of Vietnam Airlines Corporation in the North (including northern provinces and cities and Ha Tinh province). Since its establishment, the office has recorded remarkable achievements in building up, maintaining and developing strong relations with important customers with the orientation of "establishing firm, close relations with customers".

The office has to date had hundreds of large and potential customers that are organisations and agencies such as sales agents, tourism companies, labour export companies, and companies specialising in organising overseas study courses and fairs. These customers have become distribution channels for Vietnam Airlines to provide passengers with high-quality services and products.

Besides, the Northern Regional Office has had a close cooperation with large enterprises of Vietnam such as the Vietnam Oil and Gas Corp, the Vietnam Post and Telecommunication Corp (VNPT), and international organisations in Vietnam, including the World Bank, UNDP, JICA, the US Embassy, and joint ventures such as Toyota, Honda and LG. The organisations are always provided with preferential policies and necessary support when traveling on Vietnam Airlines flights.

Apart from the business cooperation, the office annually offers a series of after-sales services, promotions and sport events to strengthen the strategic relations. One of the activities is the Vietnam Airlines Golf Tournament that has been held annually from 2001. Golf is an emerging sport in Vietnam, therefore, in addition to promoting the image of Vietnam Airlines and having access to its targeted customers, the tournament is expected to partly help the game further grow.

This year's tournament opened on October 23, 2004 at the King's Island Golf Club in Dong Mo, Ha Tay province with the participation of 160 golfers who were Vietnam Airlines customers from domestic and foreign companies, international organisations, embassies, and traditional customers having the Golden Lotus Plus certificates.

The Vietnam Airlines Golf Tournament 2004 successfully ended and many attractive awards, including Vietnam Airlines return tickets, services of five-star hotels and others, and gifts from lucky draws were presented to the game's winners. At the ceremony to presenting awards held on the evening of the same day at the Sheraton Hanoi Hotel – one of the main sponsors of the game, Ms. Nguyen Thi Thu Ha who won the Ladies Best Net prize said: "The Vietnam Airlines Golf Tournament 2004 not only helps players share experience in the newly-emerging game in Vietnam but also creates good chances for them to exchange views and establish business relations. I hope that the Northern Regional Office will continue to organise the tournament in the following years."

Mr. Nguyen Manh Hung, who played the game at the club since it became operational, stressed: "Through the annual golf tournament, the strategy to reach customers of the Northern Regional Office is on track. More potential customers - players with high incomes - will be on Vietnam Airlines flights when golf has become an effective, friendly bridge for them. In my opinion, the following tournaments will lure larger numbers of businessmen because they will have more opportunities to polish and promote their enterprises' reputation in the eyes of their business partners through such golf tournaments."

Notably, the Best Gross award of this year's tournament was presented to 18-year-old potential golfer Nguyen Thai Duong (Gross 73), a Vietnamese national. He has attached with the game for four years and now is pursuing a golf training course in Malaysia with the passion of becoming one of the first professional golfers in Vietnam. In addition, among amateur players winning superior prizes, foreign players, mainly including businessmen from Korea and Japan working in Vietnam, accounted for up to over 50 per cent.     

List of winners of Vietnam Airlines Golf Tournament 2004:

Best Net: KIM Ji Bae, Director of Vidamco, Net 68, Handicap 12 –

2^nd Best Net: Hoang Ngoc Nhat, Vice Minister of Public Security Ministry, Net 67, Handicap 14

3^rd Best Net: Vu Xuan Hop, Net 68, Handicap 17

Best Gross: Nguyen Thai Duong, potential young golf player of Vietnam, Gross 73    

Ladies Best net: Ms. Nguyen Thi Thu Ha, Net 72, Handicap 25

Near Pin:

Near Pin #3 (hole 3): Itaru Hosoda

Near Pin #10: Hoang Tien Dung

Near Pin #14: Ms. Harumi Hashimoto

Near Pin #17: Nguyen Van Kim

Long drive #9: Kim Woong Hee

Accurate Drive #4 : Han Sang Yeol