A FORMER staff of a German tour operator is offering a collection of free high quality destination and hotel photos from Asia to aid travel companies in their production of travel brochures.

Established in early 2011, Travelphotos24 now boasts a database of more than 12,000 images, many of which depict nature, people and culture of Asian destinations. The website also captures information on hotel facilities and contact details.

Marc Sievert, managing director of Travelphotos24, told TTG Asia e-Daily that the complimentary photo database was set up to provide fellow tour operators relief to a problem he once had to endure.

He said: “In one of my previous jobs I used to be responsible for brochure production for a large German tour operator. One of my roles was to collect images from various hotels around the world. With the Internet we could easily get images from various websites, but these images were often not of high resolution. Furthermore, it was a struggle to go on several websites to get images and description.

“I have always imagined how great it would be to have one single website (offering) images of hotels and destinations for free to tour operators.”

Sievert said that most images provided by Travelphotos24 were sourced from “friends and colleagues” who travelled around Asia, as well as national tourism boards, hotels and other suppliers.

More than 2,000 travel operators and incentive houses worldwide are registered users of Travelphotos24, and the number is expected to grow.

Hotels can have their images, facility information and promotional offers listed on Travelphotos24 for an annual fee of 150 euros (US$187.40) a year (excluding service tax).