Windhoek, 23 August 2020 – Since Mid-May 2020 up until 31 August 2020, Namibia Wildlife Resorts Limited (NWR) slashed all its rates to a low N$ 600 per room to respond to the changing market conditions as well as stimulate domestic travel. NWR was pleased to see the local market react positively to the special rate, that saw some of its resorts in the Etosha National Park and its Sossus Dune Lodge in the Namib Naukluft Park have busy weekends and some occupancies during the week.
For the past four months, NWR has been significantly subsidising its guests to provide them with relief in these challenging times. However, for any organisation to remain sustainable in the current market conditions, it needs to periodically align its rates to its operational costs. Thus, as from 1 September 2020, NWR will be introducing new domestic rates that will be valid up until 30 November 2021. These rates will see resorts such as Sossus Dune Lodge, that usually cost N$ 2800 per person excluding meals, starting from N$ 1200 per person, inclusive of Breakfast and Dinner. For Namleisure cardholders, the rate will start from N$ 1000 per person. Equally, Okaukuejo that charges N$ 1425 per person, excluding meals, will start from N$ 550 per person inclusive of Breakfast and N$ 400 per person for Namleisure cardholders. For those that enjoy camping, for a group of four, they will only pay N$ 400 per campsite.
“We are pleased that the N$ 600 per room special was well received by the local market and we are grateful for each guest that visited us during the past four months. With the recent trip that I embarked on with my team to some of our resorts, I was pleased to see several guests staying with us even during the week. Though, with every product or service, there is always room for improvement. That’s why after the comments that we received from the time we started the special and the customer feedback survey that we ran that had 622 respondents, we were able to identify the matters that our guests wanted us to improve on. Therefore, for all our new domestic rates; meals have been included. Guests choosing to visit Popa Falls or Onkoshi will have the opportunity to opt for the full-board price, resulting in them only having to worry about getting themselves to the resort and the rest leave to us to take care of” says Dr Matthias Ngwangwama, NWR Managing Director.
During the same period, NWR was the first hospitality establishment in the country to offer some of its facilities to the Ministry of Health and Social Services to be used as isolation facilities. With the experience that NWR gained and the need for isolation facilities for the near future, NWR decided to offer /Ai-/Ais Hotsprings and Spa, Hardap and Waterberg as their official isolation facilities.
“Gross Barmen that had been previously used as an isolation facility was removed from the list after many requests from our guests. I am therefore pleased to say that the resort was disinfected for the past two weeks and will start welcoming guests from 24 August 2020” says Mr Epson Kasuto, NWR Chief Marketing Officer.
