be promoted overseas on television. Television promotion is, of course, an expensive way to go but it is the way many Caribbean destinations have chosen.

Jamaica especially makes extensive use of television promotion in the US East Coast area. It is clear that the Caribbean is becoming steadily more competitive with Bermuda.

We can only think that the television promotion opinion expressed by Mr. Steve Belkin whose company, Trans National Travel-Haley, is the second largest seller of holiday packages to Bermuda, should be taken very seriously. Mr.

Belkin is, after all, the person who does the selling of Bermuda. It sometimes seems that Bermuda pays far too little attention to the travel professionals who are involved with the buying public.

Mr. Belkin has said: "Bermuda does do a little television advertising but it could do more. This is the feedback we are getting from our different sales representatives in the field.'' Some of the ads for other resorts on American television are clearly selling sex, sand, sun and sea with a heavy emphasis on the sex. Bermuda does not have to do that to sell Bermuda but we think it does have to change.

Bermuda has spent a long time and a great many dollars preserving its image as a quality resort for travellers in higher income brackets. That seems to us to be the correct approach because Bermuda is not big enough to deal in numbers.

However we think that these days quality marketing can be conveyed on television.

We think Bermuda has assumed over the years that television ads were somehow demeaning and that top resorts used the print media rather than broadcast.

That assumption was probably correct but it may no longer be right for today's Bermuda tourism. We have to remember that we now have more cruise ship berths to sell and everyone's market is changing.

We also have to remember that Bermuda is changing in ways we sometimes do not like to face. We no longer have the "isles of rest'' that we once sold to visitors. It would also be true to say that with the introduction of such things as jet skis and the helicopter, we no longer try to preserve the peace and quiet we once sold. That is only one example of change. We have also moved from being a place where people spent their annual holiday to a place where people take a quick break. There are many other changes which mean that we have to consider the way we sell Bermuda or else we are misleading the client.

Basically, we are no longer a "sleepy English village'' yet if you look at the ads that is what we are still selling.

There are plenty of good and enjoyable things about Bermuda which we can promote. Bermuda also has more depth and a good deal of variety which many resorts lack and which we can advertise. We have hardly touched cultural tourism.

As we see it, there could be a problem in sticking with our usual advertising.

Bermuda may be in the position of advertising to the world that it is so sedate that visitors will not have a good time here. There is a difference between the well run and enjoyable resort Bermuda should be and a resort which is so stuffy it is a bore.