With the sluggish U.S. economy, the Hawaii Tourism Authority is working with Flight Centre Limited, a global travel agency.

In hopes of selling Hawaii as a hot vacation spot to more international markets.  The company awarded top financial performers with a trip to Hawaii.  While here, they'll be doing a little research to take back home.

"They're shopping, they're eating out at restaurants we've got some familiarization trips going to the neighbor islands," said Helen Williams of the Hawaii Tourism Oceania from Australia. "So we're taking a lot of the agents to show them as much as we possibly can about Hawaii."

"Since this is one of the largest operations in the world," said Rex Johnson, President of the Hawaii Tourism Authority, "it's very very important for these folks to get to know what hawaii is as a destination."

Flight Centre is based in Australia, but has offices on three different continents.  Johnson says the remainder of the year will be a little slow for the industry, but he's hopeful things will pick up again in 2009. 

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