June 2026
focus on family time and the involvement of adults and kids alike in resort life. The property also offers the ability for adults to relax and enjoy separate time across the property through programmes such as the ‘supper club’. “The supper club is an opportunity for parents to put their children into an evening club. They go in at 7 o’clock and from 7 until 9, [the resort] entertains them. [the resort] takes them for dinner. [The resort] looks after them, and that gives the parents a really nice break to be able to say, look, we’re on holiday, but you know, one night we want to eat just the two of us.” “The supper club was designed to be able to give those parents that little bit of me time when they need it and we do the same on the beach. We call it our beach babe service, where the kids can be just put into the kids’ club on the beach.” Encouraging guests to enjoy their time, their way as at the forefront of Ikos’ goals for guests; so much so, the brand actively pursues local eateries to include within its all-inclusive offering. “As a brand, we actively encourage our guests to experience the area that they’re in as well and it’s really important for us to be able to do that. So we do that in a number of different ways. One is we have a mini drive adventure where we have a fleet of electric minis in every single property that are free for our guests to take out once per day.” Guests can take the mini out, can go to see the local area, and the car is electric, so it falls within the resort’s 100% renewable energy pledge. “We pre- purchased a number of different passes in different areas, so it might be the Picasso Museum in Hungalucia, or its free green fees at the golf course in Corfu. So there’s certain things that we pre-purchase for our guests that they can use to leave the resort and go out and experience a little bit more of the destination they’re in.” He continued, “we offer our dining round experience as well so we have at least two to three
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restaurants that are local restaurants that are linked with our hotel where you can go and dine for free and it’s included on the all inclusive.” Lee explained that wine, soft drinks and beers are all included within these hand-selected external restaurants, helping to encourage visitors to explore the destination. He also explained how 75% of the staff are local to the area in which the property sits, so the money goes back into the economy. “We buy all of our produce from local farmers and local distributors and then we encourage our guests to go out. So we prepay for these restaurants, so that these restaurants benefit from our guests in the resort. And then we pre-purchase cultural passes to encourage people to go out and spend money in the local economy as well. It’s a win-win for everybody.” Ikos Kissamos, near Chania, is a large beachfront development designed to blend in with the natural landscape of Crete whilst emphasising sustainability, including plans for LEED Gold certification for Building Design and Construction. “We’re on that side of the island in a beautiful,
unspoiled, more natural landscape than maybe some of the other
built-up areas within Crete. It’s a beautiful property, brand new build, all low-rise, and it sits on 600 metres of this stunning beach.” Lee speaks of how Ikos Resorts lends itself to heightening its offering for customers each time its develops a new property; “every time we open a new property, we elevate in more ways- in different ways. We have sensory gardens throughout the resort. We’ve got fantastic restaurants that you’ll find as staple restaurants within Ikos, but on top of that, we have our local restaurant Kriti, which offers traditional Cretan food.” The brand new property is newly opened, boasting 4 villages throughout “we’ve broken the resort down into 4 villages. So we have our river village, our main village, and we have our sea village and we have our dunes village. By doing that, it makes the resort feel smaller again for our guests. It doesn’t feel like a big hotel. Each village includes a pool, pool bar, pool service, all the things that you could possibly want with easy access to all the restaurants and sports facilities within the property.” Ikos Kissimos has also introduced paddle
courts to its facilities with its growth in popularity. Lee explained what the future looks like for the popular resort brand, highlighting its future openings in 2028 and new location within Portugal. For those wanting to find out more about the properties, Lee suggests “speaking to your local travel professional. If you want to find out more and work out which is the best property for them and when they should go, then speak to their local trade or travel professional, to be able to get more information. We work with every agent within Northern Ireland.” Rounding off, Lee highlighted how there is still opportunity to book for this year. “It’s not too late to book availability, especially for families throughout the summer. So, you know, it’s never too late to look at what we can offer for them this year.”
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