Mexico Trade Retreat Creates Opportunities for California Partners

Visit California and a delegation of 28 business and destination partners traveled to San Miguel de Allende, Mexico for a Trade Retreat to meet with 60+ travel trade, Jan. 25-27. Throughout the course of the week, delegates and guests engaged in relationship-building activities, 1-1 meetings, and interactive events. 

The new retreat format, which debuted in November in the U.K. market, offers California partners multiple touch points to engage with trade executives and strengthen these invaluable relationships. The format creates more opportunities for longer one-on-one and group engagements, enhanced by such as a winery tour and tasting, traditional Mexican pastry making, cocktail making, meditation and bike building for charity.  

By the numbers:

• 28 California trade industry partners — Visit California's largest trade delegation to Mexico! 
• 17 destinations
• 11 assessed businesses including hotels, retail and attractions
• 25 Mexico-based VIP trade buyers were brought into meet with partners in San Miguel de Allende
• 32 travel agents from Price Travel trained 
• 6 bikes built and donated to Mexican Association for Aid to Children with Cancer as part of the relationship-building activities

Mexico remains one of the largest and most important markets for California post-pandemic. Mexico was one of the only markets to never fully close during the pandemic leading to a strong peso and inflation on par with the US. Air and ground entry remained relatively strong through the pandemic, and airlift looks to increase when Mexico regains its “category 1” FAA status this March, allowing new inbound routes to be opened by Mexican carriers.

The retreat also made clear that California professional sports have become a major interest driver for the state. Traveling games in Mexico by the 49ers have been incredibly popular, and the upcoming Padres-Giants game in April is expected to drive a surge of interest in California Major League Baseball. 

The FAA downgrade created an opening for U.S. carriers to increase their presence in Mexico. United representatives discussed how this is impacting their business and their future plans.
Notably, they are expanding flight service into Mexico in 2024/25.

To help California partners take advantage of increased visitation and air traffic out of Mexico, Visit California will be offering co-ops for California industry partners with AeroMexico, Viajes el Corte Ingles and Price Travel.

The Mexican travel advisors and tour operators at the event also shared invaluable insights about their market. Here are some of the key takeaways:

• Inflation is holding steady in the market allowing for travel to remain a top priority, but price is still the top barrier to travel. 
• California is one of the top destinations due to ease of access and overall price in comparison to other destinations like Europe.
• Los Angeles and San Francisco are top destinations for California.
• More people, including younger generations, are booking with agents to secure the best prices and level of knowledge. 
• There is a huge opportunity for expanding knowledge of California destinations outside of the gateways. 
• Luxury travelers in Mexico are a big opportunity for California. 
• Travel within Mexico has gotten very expensive, if not more so, than traveling to the U.S. This is actually an opportunity for California destinations vs a beach destination in Mexico. 
• Visa wait times are 6-8 months, so repeat visitors are high priority as they don’t face this lengthy wait. 
• Price Travel is already outpacing their 2019 numbers, strong evidence that travel is a top priority for the market. 

Visit California will continue to utilize the new retreat format given the success of this event, reinforced by overwhelmingly positive survey feedback from delegates and the record number of delegates participating.