LATCB AT WORK – JANUARY 2014

Around the world, in town, and on the web, LATCB is working to help grow and support the Los Angeles tourism community and keep the world coming to LA. 

Hay pocas cosas mejores que una buena comida y entre ellas están una panorámica espectacular. Siempre hay algo especial en el Océano Pacífico como telón de fondo o las luces centelleantes de la ciudad que marcan el tono perfecto para una salida a cenar. El ambiente orgánico de una vista impresionante realza la experiencia de la velada y da un toque de sofisticación a cualquier cita o salida casual. Ver Mas →

VIRGIN ATLANTIC AND CHAMPION OF CHAMPIONS FAM

The LATCB International Team hosted a FAM (familiarization) trip in partnership with Virgin Atlantic and Champion of Champions, Dec. 2-3 with a group of 20 travel trade professionals from the U.K. to allow them to experience LA’s exciting attractions, new products, and our members and partners in person.  

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The LATCB International Team attended Emirates’ A380 event at Los Angeles International Airport’s (LAX) Tom Bradley International Terminal (TBIT) for the inaugural flight on Dec. 2. More than 150 invited guests attended the reception including local travel industry members, Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) staff and City officials. LA Mayor Eric Garcetti officially welcomed Emirates’ A380 upon arrival. All guests were invited to take an on-board tour of Emirates’ luxurious A380 to learn more about the jet and route in order to promote this new air service to LA. 

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The LATCB International Team participated in the ANTOR (Association of National Tourist Representatives) World Christmas Party at the Travel Café in Tokyo on Dec. 5. Los Angeles, Finland, Switzerland, Belgium, Hungary and the Philippines participated in the event, meant to promote Christmas and New Year’s holiday season activities and attractions at each destination. LATCB Asia Pacific gave a presentation on “Christmas and New Year's in LA” to 121 attendees who are frequent overseas travelers, featuring a social media board with a QR code enabling attendees to immediately “like” LATCB on Facebook. The event also had a charitable component to raise funds for relief efforts for those impacted by the cyclone disaster in the Philippines. 

LATCB participated in seminars and appointments at the RTO (receptive tour operators) Summit, Dec. 11-13 in Orlando. Formerly known as the NAJ Summits, the RTO Summits are a series of three boutique networking marketplaces—RTO Summit West (Los Angeles), RTO Summit East (New York) and RTO Summit+MICE (Orlando) — where destinations and suppliers meet with RTOs (receptive tour operators) in 10-minute appointment sessions in order to grow their international business, in a limited attendance event. It brought together 35 RTOs from 29 companies along with 35 destinations and suppliers. The LATCB team had 16 scheduled one-on-one meetings with buyers, including receptive operators, destination management companies and travel consultants, and met with four local receptive operators that did not attend the conference.

LATCB’s International Tourism Team set up sales calls and meetings with a dozen Los Angeles-based Local Receptive Operators, Dec. 17-19. During the office visits, the team provided product updates, discussed opportunities to work together in the future, discussed programs to work on together and offered the LATCB team as the definitive Los Angeles resource for the Inbound Operators. Local Receptive Operators are an effective way to get the message out about our members and partners to the visitor market as they service clients from all over the global and handle international travel for fully escorted tours to FIT travelers to Los Angeles/USA. 

British Airways UK FAM, Dec. 2-7

The LATCB Communications Team hosted a group of journalists from UK-based travel trade publications in partnership with British Airways for a FAM trip in December. The group experienced some of LA’s most exciting attractions, hotels and neighborhoods, and toured Los Angeles International Airport’s (LAX) new Tom Bradley International Terminal (TBIT), which started operations in September 2013. The publications included The Business Travel Magazine (circulation – 57,109, page ad rate - $7,300), TTG Luxury, and TTG (circulation – 18,578, page ad rate - $9,500), TTG Luxury (circulation - 12,000, page ad rate - $7,800), Selling Longhaul (circulation, - 17,500, page ad rate – $6,162), and Travel Weekly (circulation – 14,785, page ad rate - $2,300). The reporters were hosted by a number of partners including Four Seasons Beverly Hills, Universal Studios Hollywood, and Bikes & Hikes LA.