TravelMole Blog: A more serious attitude?
Monday, 13 Oct, 2009
0
TravelMole’s Graham McKenzie reflects on last week’s Travel Convention in Barcelona
It’s interesting what a difference a year makes.
This time in 20O8 I was pondering as to the effectiveness and value of the Travel Convention.
Travel thousands of miles just to go on the piste? Brag about how late, who, when, how much?
But Barcelona was different. How so? Well, I think the location lent itself to better and more serious networking. The hotels were away from the attractions of Las Ramblas and other hot spots of the city.
In the past it’s been all too easy to just walk across the road, literally last year, to find Club Trouble and Club Hangover. Not necessarily something that has stopped people in the past, but nevertheless a contributory factor.
We are all a year older and as time passes so does one’s ability to survive a 5am finish and 9am start.
The most important factor, however, must surely be that delegates are now having to be more focussed.
Life has changed in the travel industry in the past year and time spent away at a conference now must see a return on that investment.
Having four or less hours sleep is not conducive to good business or respect within the fraternity.
An example of this was on the Wednesday night when buses returning to the conference hotels gave people the option of getting off and going to a bar area – on my bus out of, say, 50 people only three got off.
Typical? I don’t know but indicative perhaps of a change of attitude. Or is it me just becoming a grumpy old git?
Phil Davies
Vegas’s Billion-Dollar Secrets – What They Don’t Want Tourists to Know
Visit Florida’s New CEO Bryan Griffin Shares His Vision for State Tourism with Graham
Chicago’s Tourism Renaissance: Graham Interviews Kristin Reynolds of Choose Chicago
Graham Talks with Cassandra McCauley of MMGY NextFactor About the Latest Industry Research
Destination International’s Andreas Weissenborn: Research, Advocacy, and Destination Impact
Graham and Don Welsh Discuss the Success of Destinations International’s Annual Conference
Graham and CEO Andre Kiwitz on Ventura Travel’s UK Move and Recruitment for the Role
Brett Laiken and Graham Discuss Florida’s Tourism Momentum and Global Appeal
Graham and Elliot Ferguson on Positioning DC as a Cultural and Inclusive Global Destination
Graham Talks to Fraser Last About His England-to-Ireland Trek for Mental Health Awareness
Kathy Nelson Tells Graham About the Honour of Hosting the World Cup and Kansas City’s Future
Graham McKenzie on Sir Richie Richardson’s Dual Passion for Golf and His Homeland, Antigua
ADS PRO 
Clearing CSS/JS assets' cache... Please wait until this notice disappears...
Updating... Please wait...
France prepares for a massive strike across all transports on September 18
Turkish tourism stalls due to soaring prices for accommodation and food
CCS Insight: eSIMs ready to take the travel world by storm
Germany new European Entry/Exit System limited to a single airport on October 12, 2025
Airlines suspend Madagascar services following unrest and army revolt