Athens to Host Europe’s Premier R&R Hospitality Conference for Next 3 Years

FORUM SA (organizer of HORECA expo) President & CEO Thanasis Panagoulias, Hellenic Chamber of Hotels President Alexandros Vassilikos, Enterprise Greece Managing Director Marinos Giannopoulos and GNTO Secretary General Dimitris Fragakis.

Athens, Greece, for the next three years will be the host destination for the Resort & Residential Hospitality Forum (R&R), Europe’s only resort-focused investment conference.

Organized by Questex, the R&R is dedicated to real estate investments – with an emphasis on residential and hospitality – but also on the development and operation of integrated tourist resorts in the Mediterranean region.

Formerly known as the Mediterranean Resort & Hotel Real Estate Forum (MR&H), the R&R provides a platform for networking and marketing significant tourist projects to a global audience of hotel chain owners, investors, manufacturers, and managers. It is noted that Athens had hosted the MR&H in 2018 and 2019.

The 2024 R&R forum will take place in Athens this October under the cooperation of the Hellenic Chamber of Hotels, the Greek National Tourism Organization (GNTO) and Enterprise Greece, the official investment and trade promotion agency of the Greek state.

Announcing the news during a press conference on Wednesday, Hellenic Chamber of Hotels President Alexandros Vassilikos highlighted the event’s significance for Greek hoteliers in times of global competition and big challenges.

Hellenic Chamber of Hotels President Alexandros Vassilikos.

“Knowledge is power for Greek hoteliers… For three years, Athens will be at the center of the dialogue on all the trends and developments of the international market, providing the Greek hotelier with the privilege of timely and valid information about them,” he said.

More details on the R&R conference in Athens are expected to be announced soon.

Highlighting that the R&R event is known for attracting tourism investments to its host countries, Enterprise Greece Managing Director Marinos Giannopoulos said he was proud that Greece was selected as the event’s location.

Enterprise Greece Managing Director Marinos Giannopoulos.

“After an intensive effort by Enterprise Greece, we succeeded in being selected as organizers, thus strengthening the image of Greece as a tourist destination of global scope and as a tourist market with excellent investment opportunities,” he said.

On his part, GNTO Secretary General Dimitris Fragakis underlined that the selection of Greece as host country for top-level international conferences is of major importance for the tourism industry and is in line with the organization’s strategy for promoting Greek tourism through cooperations.

GNTO Secretary General Dimitris Fragakis.

“In this context, the GNTO will also present a broad program of collaborations with airlines and tour operators,” he said, informing that the GNTO will continue its effort to maintain high demand for Greece and for 2024 to be even a better year for the industry.

7th International Hospitality Forum

During the press conference, Hellenic Chamber of Hotels President Alexandros Vassilikos gave details on the upcoming International Hospitality Forum (IHF) that is to take place at the Metropolitan Expo in Athens on February 10.

Organized by the Hellenic Chamber of Hotels, the IHF serves as a central meeting point for the hospitality industry, bringing together international tourism brands, top professionals, Greek and foreign experts, distinguished academics and tourism entrepreneurs.

Hellenic Chamber of Hotels President Alexandros Vassilikos giving details on the last International Hospitality Forum (IHF).

In its 7th year and powered by the organizers of the R&R conference, Questex, 2024 will be the IHF’s final year as an event. From next year, the IHF will be held as an independent session of Questex’s R&R conference in Athens.

“The fundamental mission of the chamber is to ensure that all of our members have direct access to knowledge, experiences and good practices that are of decisive importance in making their business decisions,” Vassilikos said, adding that the chamber’s “mission” has been served with great success by the IHF for seven years.

“The successes, however, do not make us content and we are raising the bar even higher by becoming part of the R&R conference that we succeeded in bringing to Greece,” he said.

Taking place on the sidelines of the HORECA 2024 hotel exhibition, the 7th IHF will host two discussion panels on:

– “Opportunities and Risks in the Era of Branding, Management, and Franchise”, which will explore the evolving and challenging realities in the hotel industry; and

– “Generational Change and Wealth Management”, which will examine the challenges arising as the Greek tourism industry matures and undergoes a generational shift, with management passing from the original founders to the second and third generations.

The speakers of the 7th IHF will be announced shortly.

The Greek Travel Pages (GTP) is a media supporter of the 7th International Hospitality Forum.