Valamar Blog

The camps Lanterna and Solaris in Porec, under the management of the company Valamar Hotels & Resorts, are the holders of the highest grade (8.6) among all the camps in Croatia in a new camping guide of the Dutch auto-club ANWB for 2008, presented at the recently held camping fair in Dutch Utrecht. Besides Lanterna and Solaris, there are two more camps managed by Valamar among the first five according to ANWB - Orsera form Warsaw (8.6) and naturist camps Politin from Krk (8.5) and Istra from Porec (8.2). The criteria for grading were overall quality of a camp (sanitary, site, supply, animation, sports activities).

“Placing four camps that are under Valamar’s management among the first five highest-ranked camps in Croatia represents particular success, considering the fact that ANWB is one of the two most significant camping guides in the Netherlands, a very important market for us”, says Josipa Cvelic-Bonifacic, executive operations director in charge of camps at Valamar.
Naturist camp Solaris has won another important reward for 2008, namely the so called “yellow board” by ADAC, a German automobile association. ADAC has 12 million members, among them there are three million camper members and it is an undisputable authority concerning camping tourism. Their camping guide for 2008 was also presented at recently held camping fair in Stuttgart. This valuable ADAC’s recognition is awarded to camps that have achieved exceptional results during an inspection last year, namely at least four or five stars for sanitary standard and at least three stars for organization of accommodation units. For this award, small and big camps compete alike. In the ADAC’s guide, besides the camp’s name there is also a mark of the “yellow board”, and the camps proudly present the awarded boars at their entrance.

According to Josipa Cvelic-Bonifacic, the ADAC’s board is awarded for a specific year, but during a new inspection the following year, in case of maintaining the same high level of quality, it can be awarded again. “The guests have high expectations of the camp that is the bearer of a “yellow board”. It is often the case that the quests are more critical of such camps than of other camps. So the winners of this award are not only objects of special attention of the ADAC’s inspectors, but also of high expectations and wishes of its guests”, explains Valamar’s camp manager.
It is important to point out that in the ADAC’s guide for 2008, six camps under Valamar’s management have been ranked among the 30 best camps in Croatia.

Within the Valamar group, there are nine camps altogether, six in Istria, two on Krk and one in Dubrovnik. In 2006, there were 21 million HRK invested in them, and in 2007, the amount of investment was almost double, about 40 million HRK. Apart form dividing the camp into lots and further renovation of sanitary facilities and installation of new electric cabinet, the largest investments in the camps were modernising the beaches, landscaping, construction of playgrounds and mini-clubs, football pitches and beach volleyball courts and expansion of free network accessible via personal notebooks.

Valamar continues to work on standardization of camping products at all destinations (Istria, Krk, Dubrovnik) and it invests a lot in further development of on-line booking service, so it initiated, among other things, a unique camping portal in 2007: www.camping-adriatic.com. Apart form the mentioned investment in camps and improvement of service and availability of internet capacity, Valamar expects increasingly better business results of the camps in years to come.

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