“…Well, during at least the past 7 years, we have been present here, the last 3 years were my turn at coordinating. It’s been a very interesting experience to observe how the Spanish market and in general the European market have been maturing and having more and more presence in Los Cabos and in Baja California Sur as a destination, this amongst consumers as well as between tour operators, as you already know, as of next November 2019, the first direct flight from London to Los Cabos begins, this has been very well received by the tour operators.  Everyone is waiting for the future to start direct marketing for the destination, which will open a door to the European market, we are also involved in talks regarding other flights from other destinations, from other European markets that will be very interesting.

Well we will hold a total of 40 meetings, more or less.  I’ve already had 20 meetings with tour operators, airlines and some with mass media. Tonight we have a dinner with our main business partners, where we will offer a brief presentation about the destination and how it’s behaving.  The information we have from all of them is that sales are moving very well, they’ve all been beyond expectations and sales have been above what is expected for Mexico in general. So the information we have is very positive, very encouraging in order to continue to have strong promotion and so that increasingly Los Cabos is known within the European market.

Yes, obviously we have the FITURCA trust fund, that’s an independent budget from the CPTM,  that allows us to manage and have constant promotion. We have all the strategies perfectly planned for 2019, and yes many are already running and we have already signed operating agreements with our commercial partners, with airlines, including the flight from Europe that we were discussing before.  In the situation where we must be compensating the resources which  we will stop receiving via the CPTM,  with the strategies that have to be complemented effectively, we have been talking to the private sector in Los Cabos, in order to have an escrow fund  that can receive private contributions.  There are many examples of programs that are already being prepared, at fairs where the participation of the private sector is already committed, and which will be complemented by the public sector, and what we know, is that everyone is so committed in Los Cabos, it’s going to be very successful and that will allow Los Cabos to continue consolidating its self in a different and differentiable way.

The tourist fairs are already considered, some considered with a pavilion. ANATO we are going to be in Colombia, what’s a market that we’ve been working on for the past two years, we’re continuing with meetings, we already have a working agenda with the commercial partners, and an event where we are going to have the 6 main Colombian partners and where we are going to present the destination.  At ITB in Berlin we are also going to participate.  We are analyzing if we participate with a booth for Los Cabos as such, in both ANATO and ITB. Obviously if there is a Mexican pavilion there is the opportunity to make it happen, obviously we will be there, and the same is true for some other fairs. What I’d like to say is that the pace of activity isn’t going to stop and is going to continue.

With information by Armando Figaredo

Translation by Tony Perez Dillon