But not all at once. CS Group hotels at Herdade dos Salgados in Albufeira have been chosen by Mercedes-Benz from January to March this year to host a Euro Training event which will see 15,000 Mercedes salespeople visiting the Algarve.
"In January, February and March we will hold our global training event for sales of the new C-Class, GLA and S models, in the Algarve. I believe this event will benefit the country in terms of tourism revenue," said Joerg Heinermann yesterday, president of Mercedes-Benz Portugal.
Without hinting at the total budget for the event, Mercedes-Benz did reveal that the spend for accommodation would be in excess of €8 million.
The main events will tale place at the CS Salgados Grande Hotel, but the other group units located at Herdade dos Salgados will be used also. Mercedes sales staff are expected to eb using the a golf course, the congress center and the beach at Praia Grande.
One of the hotels was scheduled to be closed over the winter period but now will be fully open to receive guests.
Desiderio Silva, president of the Algarve Tourism Board stressed "the great importance of Mercedes-Benz organising this event at Salgados, taking into account that the brand is prestigious, the number of staff involved, and the international media coverage for the Algarve region."
"This is very good for the image of the Algarve and can have very positive effects in the future" in attracting other big brands to events for which the Algarve has all the necessary infrastructure," added Silva.
Joerg Heinermann from Mercedes said that an event of this kind has very positive consequences for the future, "I believe that after spending four days in Portugal many of our salespeople will be unwilling to go home."
The hotels in the CS Salgados Group are currently managed by a Tourism Recovery Fund established by ECS Capital which is designed to recover the assets of the CS Group which went spectacularly bust.
In late 2011 and early 2012 the Algarve hosted the global launch of the BMW 3 Series. At that time four hotels belonging to different hotel groups welcomed thousands of dealers from around the world for slightly more than two months.
The Mercedes booking is the largest in the Algarve's history and represents a financial shot in the arm for the CS Group owners and the Algarve hotel sector generally.
