Travel Madness Expo gathers tourism sector under one roof
THE TRAVEL industry is out to show its might at the opening of Travel Madness Expo 2015 at the SMX Convention Center, Mall of Asia Complex today, with most of its 5,000 players poised to show up at the event as exhibitors and in other capacities to signify their unity with all the allied sectors and the general public.
All of the four exhibit halls of the SMX Convention Center have been booked for this biggest ever multisectoral participation in the Travel Madness Expo, which has been setting record highs since its debut in 2012.
“We are grooming it (Travel Madness) as a show of force and solidarity of the travel agencies with the public and all industry sectors,” said Raymond Tee, president of Travel Innovators Inc., the expo organizer, which has turned this annual event into a sourcing hub for affordable travel fares, effectively making tourism a year-round activity.
Tee explained, “The objective now is to strengthen the bond between the travel agencies and their principals for the benefit of the public and provide the lowest possible fares and the highest quality of services, even during challenging times. Tee was referring to Travel Madness as having been originally conceived to help the industry surmount its challenges through positive engagements.
“With the seasonality of travel having been practically solved with the availability of enormously discounted fares for advanced booking industry-wide, we can now focus on other issues and concerns,” Tee said.
At present, commissions for travel agencies from ticket sales are thinning out, forcing them to rely mostly on volumes to keep their heads out of the water. Yet, it is the travel agencies who can provide timely travel info and the best possible options--from the choice of airlines to suit the clients’ specific schedules and budget requirements to professional advice on appropriate and customized itineraries. The travel agencies also provide the public with official representation with the airlines and other tourism firms to help protect their interests.
Packaging worry-free tourism deals at prices that don’t exceed the rates of the airlines, the travel agencies are also more flexible than the rest of the industry in offering additional rate reductions, consequently stretching or even sacrificing their own margins to increase volume.
And during expos, the big number of travel agencies combined virtually provides a large manpower pool to assist the visitors, thus lessening, if not elimi- nating, long queues.
The travel agencies can also offer a three-day ticketing option or even longer, giving a client ample time to decide on getting issued his ticket.
“As total service providers, we (travel agencies) conduct, not just flight bookings, but many forms of assistance that literally make us a one-stop shop for all travel requirements,” said Travel Innovators vice president Maria Paz R. Alberto, also president and owner of Makatibased Ark Travel. “Add to that our after-sales services, which are just a phone call away.”
Comparing the Philippines with other countries, however, Tee said: “The Philippines is very price sensitive when compared with others that are high-fare but high-yield markets. So their travel agencies can live on back-end or volume discounts alone. We in the Philippines cannot do so. We may not survive. Thus, we will show the importance of our sector by highlighting its role in the national economy through massive participation such that you can expect a bigger Travel Madness and better travel deals this year.”
Travel Madness also enjoys large participation from global services providers, destination management companies, and many other enabling institutions.
In 2014, total earnings from inbound tourism amounted to $4.84 billion (P214.88 billion), up 10 percent from the previous year’s $4.40 billion, while domestic tourism was estimated to have reached 47 million in volume and P1.4 trillion in gross receipts.
Alberto said the growth came about despite the still ongoing rebuilding of Bohol, Leyte and many other calamity-stricken parts of the country. “It’s apparently the promos and decreasing rates from competition posed by budget airlines that obviously help drive tourism growth substantially,” Alberto said. “So let us all keep pushing our volumes up,” she said.
Supporting Travel Madness are Philippine Airlines, Bank of the Philippine Islands, Sky Cable TLC, Tourism Promotions Board, and Duty Free Philippines as major sponsors.