WTM Latin America from April 4-6
Charlie Cracknell, Senior Exhibition Director, WTM Latin America, WTM Connect Asia & International Golf Travel Market, discusses with TRAVTALK the expectations they have from the event this year.
Q How many exhibitors and buyers are you expecting at WTM Latin America this year?
WTM Latin America 2017 will be held at Expo Center Norte, a great convention center in the city of São Paulo which offers more than 75,000 square meters for exhibitions. For 2017, WTM Latin America will be even better. The focus remains on generating business. We predict to have at least 50 countries and regions represented, 650 exhibitors, more than 6,540 unique visitors and more than 500 members of the press. Q What is new at WTM Latin America this year?
The focus remains in generate business deals, but for 2017 we will have the partnerships and improvements in technology and partnerships with speakers that have several backgrounds.
We have invested also in technology and partnerships to improve participation. Now we have Hotel Map as a partner, that will offer discounts in hospitality, with the possibility to custom the offer, according to visitor’s profile. Discounts are also the proposal of the partnership between WTM Latin America and oneworld, alliance of the biggest 15 airlines in the world that brings together more than 1,000 destinations. With regard to technology, the exhibition will have in 2017 My Event platform, that will connect buyers, media and visitors encouraging business, with the features to schedule a meeting, that can also be used by journalists. The platform is also able in identifying what the exhibitor is looking for. It creates a potential list with buyers and other exhibitors after the exhibitor has answered some questions.
Q Kindly explain the expectations of the event and the total value as well.
We expected the event will be a great success, overcoming the $371 million of new business generated in 2016. We are working in partnerships and making changes in the Press Centre to have the best WTM Latin America ever. We create the My Event platform and invested in partnerships with Hotel Map and oneworld to meet the expectations of buyers, exhibitors and travel professionals that will attend the event. Thinking in the journalist, we hold a survey to listen from them what can be better in WTM Latin America and now we are putting the suggestions into practice.
Africa’s share of the global aviation is the smallest which is only around three per cent. As the largest airline group in the continent, we are highly concerned on the low base of air