Rodrigo Esponda, director of the Los Cabos Tourism Trust, pointed out the differences that exist between Los Cabos and other destinations such as those in Quintana Roo, as he explained that they prioritize rates and quality over the volume of travelers, in addition to the fact that the average number of American travelers has not dropped as in other destinations.
He explained that hotel occupancy only lost a few points compared to 2023 in the low season, as it is really the adjustment that has been made back to normal and they have had the same volume of visitors from the United States unlike the destinations in Quintana Roo. “The United States, which is our primary market, we are having the same number of passengers as we had the previous year and it is much higher than what we had in 2019,” Esponda told REPORTUR.co.
“We have some particularities as a tourist destination that make us different from what happens in other parts of Mexico. It is true that in the summer we had a slight decrease of 4% in July, 5% in August and 6% in September, compared to the same months of the previous year. However, the dynamics of the destination are different because it is not a destination that is focused so much on volume, but rather on quality and rates,” Esponda told this newspaper.
He added that they have two markets with less traffic; the first is from the interior of Mexico to Los Cabos with a little less passenger traffic, “but this has been more the result of the engine reviews of the aircraft of the Mexican airlines, where there is less equipment in circulation than there was last year and there is a restriction from Mexico City that was imposed, the Mexico City airport now has a new provision that limits the number of operations per hour and that has caused us to have a little less traffic,” added Esponda.
The other market is Canada, which has had a little less traffic, especially in the summer, “also due to the same dynamics that we were mentioning that are normalizing, even in the summer of last year, Canadians were traveling at any time, so they kind of returned to the same seasonality that they had,” said Esponda.
He pointed out that the type of customer segment they have is more for sport fishing, golf, gastronomy, for more specific activities and not so much for staying in All Inclusive hotels. In addition, they have a much larger residential component, “even people who have houses in condominiums or timeshares, so they are a more repetitive tourist than happens in other tourist destinations and this generates positive dynamics. The dynamics here are different, the market does not discount the product to encourage the flow, but rather they maintain the rates and understand that the type of market that comes is another type of traveler,” Esponda indicated to REPORTUR.co.
The average for the high season is 70% at the destination, “and that is a healthy average for us because the high rate is privileged and it spills over to discount the price by being at 97% occupancy because then you neglect quality,” he insisted.
As reported by REPORTUR.co, in September the Los Cabos Tourism Trust (FITURCA), together with a delegation of 10 hotels and 4 tour operators (DMC’s), carried out a series of promotional events in strategic cities such as Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg and Zurich. These activities, carried out in collaboration with Condor Airlines, prepare the ground for the inauguration of the new direct air route between Frankfurt and Los Cabos, which will begin operating on November 3, 2024
Source: reportur
