IN a country where a perfectly presented honey-dew melon — gift-wrapped of course — can cost around AUD$800, fruit is regarded by the Japanese as a luxury gift.
Savvy businesses have now cottoned on and are also aware that Japanese travellers are obliged by custom to buy gifts for friends and family when travelling overseas.
Tropical Fruit World, Australia’s largest fruit agri-tourist farm, is capitalising on these two facts and recently had its key team members trained in Japanese customer service.
Tropical Fruit World operations manager Aymon Gow, has enlisted internationally recognised training and consulting company TravConsult, to educate his team on the service needs and expectations, cultural differences and communication skills necessary to successfully interact with Japanese tourists.
With Jetstar flying direct from Osaka to the Gold Coast, Gow says having the world’s largest variety of tropical fruit should be a winner with Japanese visitors.
“We envisage attracting many of these new Japanese tourists to our unique attraction and property and we want to give them the best experience possible, especially when they interact with our team,” says Gow.
TravConsult managing director Trevor Lee says first impressions count with Japanese people, who are by nature are quite shy and reserved.
“Acknowledging their presence alone can often be the incentive they need to make a purchase,” he says.
“And if the staff show genuine gratitude for their visit and true Australian friendliness and assistance, the Japanese will enjoy their visit more and no doubt, spend more at the same time.
“Our strength lies in developing more culturally-aware teams who really want to provide a ‘wow’ customer service experience to all visitors and customers.
“And that means increased sales, return business and word-of-mouth recommendations.”
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