Colombia Hotel Boom Spurred on by Starwood, Four Seasons and InterContinental
Skift Take
After decades of strife, Colombia has surged into the Latin American tourism limelight with a strong hotel tax incentive and smart marketing campaign inspired by famous local author, Gabriel García Márquez.
When former Colombian President Álvaro Uribe introduced a tax incentive law over a decade ago that offered a 30-year exemption on taxes derived from hotel services for any hotels beginning construction before December 2017, a lot of global hotel brands passed.
At the time, the Colombian brand was still attached to the country's previous role as the cocaine trafficking capital of the world, and all of the violence associated with that.
Since then, however, few countries have ever experienced such a quick turnaround in tourism development as Colombia, following years of civic improvements and security initiatives throughout the country. The global hotel brands are moving in now in force, and their marketing and distribution firepower is going to continue to spur the increase in international arrivals over the last few years.
By the close of 2014, according to Colombia's
