St. Lucia’s Tourism Minister Ernest Hilaire says marketing efforts are expected to pay off during the upcoming tourism winter season with a number of increases already being confirmed and realized in the airlift department.
The minister highlighted that even while some islands are experiencing a decline in their airlift and the number of seats coming to their destination, St. Lucia is expecting increased numbers.
“For this year, this season, November 2026 to March 2027, we expect to have 295,244 seats available. The growth, when compared year on year, is a 7.3% so we’ve noted a significant increase. The United States increases by 9.3%, Canada increases by 59.1% and specifically American {Airlines} out of Miami will be twice a day service across the winter period. We will see it move into a daily service from Charlotte from November to March, Philadelphia we will see moving from once a week to free times a week and again that’s American in December February and March and they go back just for the month of January, they will be once a week.”
The minister continued, “United {Airlines} out of Newark from mid-December to January, there’ll be a daily service, previously it used to be once a week. JetBlue out of New York will put on a larger aircraft so increasing the number of seats, Delta out of Atlanta will continue the daily service but on Saturdays it will be twice a day. Air Canada in November move into 4 times a week, December 5 times a week, January 5 times a week, February 5 times a week March 5 times a week. Westjet from January will move to 4 times a week, February 4 times a week.”
The consistently worrisome UK market is also expected to deliver an increased number of seats into the island. The tourism minister revealed that the traditional British Airways flight shared between St. Lucia, Grenada and Trinidad and Tobago will be converted into dedicated flights on a daily basis. That, according to Hilaire, will record an increase of approximately 36%.
The tourism minister says he is satisfied with the effort to help bolster the number of seats coming to the island and was hopeful that it actually translated into greater arrivals.
He reminded that while the increased numbers were welcomed, a metric that is usually used to judge success in the industry, St. Lucia would do better with quality.
He further explained that fringe efforts to improve the visitor experience was taking shape and recognized the world over. He made particular mention of the Community Tourism Program and the recently constituted underwater museum on the west coast.