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Six Irish tourism companies, including Killarney Hotels, are attending SMU (Successful Meetings University) International, which takes place this week in New York. The three-day event attracts around 100 top American MICE (meetings, incentives, conferences and events) professionals, all on the lookout for exciting and unique business tourism destinations.

“Events like SMU International are an important platform to continue to build awareness of the island of Ireland and our world-class business tourism offering. Business tourism is the most lucrative form of tourism, with visitors travelling to Ireland for business purposes spending about 2.5 times more than the average holidaymaker,” said Alison Metcalfe, Tourism Ireland’s Head of North America.

“In 2017, we welcomed a record 1.83 million North American visitors to the island of Ireland. In 2018, we are confident that our strategy – combined with more airline seats than ever before from the US, as well as the strength and competitiveness of the vacation experience right around the island of Ireland – will deliver further growth. Our aim is to deliver a +5% increase in visitor numbers and +7% increase in revenue from North America in 2018. We look forward to welcoming more of our great friends from the United States this year and in the years to come.”