With revenge travel still driving up the numbers of local and foreign visitors in tourist spots, many travelers looked for more ways to save as they explored new places and gained new experiences.
Eager to help tourists with this endeavor, the Travel Sale Expo (TSE) opened its doors once again for its second year and offered a wide array of travel discounts with its theme “Experience the World, Travel is Life.”
During the media conference for the upcoming expo, TSE 2024 chairperson Michelle Taylan shared how the event’s theme aimed to encourage people to actively travel more as there were many things that they had yet to see, learn, and experience in both the Philippines and other countries.
“Nowadays, travel is considered a regular activity because it is a part of our life. So at the Travel Sale Expo, we made sure that we could make travel convenient and more affordable by offering discounted fares through our airline partners and discounted tour packages,” said Taylan.
With the event providing numerous offerings to travelers, Taylan shared that there were many things she looked forward to during the event.
“What made me excited was the different destinations that we offered to our visitors that gave them, of course, more options to choose where they could travel all over the world and most especially the excitement from our visitors to see their favorite performers that performed in the three-day event,” she said.
“I was always excited to see the stakeholders or the different members of our associations that were able to offer their different packages and services to many people,” she added.
In its second year, the Travel Sale Expo had 176 exhibitors that were made up of airlines, hotels, travel agencies, cruise liners, resorts, tour operators, insurance companies, theme parks, food concessionaires, and embassies, which occupied a total of 200 booths. Retail outfits that offered travel accessories ranging from bags fit for traveling to shoes and clothing made to brave any weather were also present at the event along with booths providing wedding supplies and assistance for those planning to have a destination wedding.
Apart from such exhibitors, several branches of the government concerned with tourism such as the Department of Tourism (DOT-NCR) Philippines, Tourism Infrastructure and Enterprise Zone Authority (TIEZA), and the Philippines Retirement Authority (PRA) had booths of their own along with ASEAN nations like Malaysia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, and Brunei, who all aimed to promote their countries as tourism spots for Filipino travelers.
The three-day expo also featured various corporate game shows, product updates, exhibitors and sponsors’ presentations, raffle draws, conferences, and entertainment programs for attendees to enjoy. Some events included cultural performances from the Korean Cultural Office, K-pop dances, a K-pop singing competition, standup comedian Boobsie performance, and Quezon City Symphonic Band music.
There was also an awarding ceremony towards the end of the expo where the Travel Sale Expo King and Queen Award, the Embassy Award, and the Exhibitor’s Top-Grossing Award were given to respective winners.
The Travel Sale Expo 2024 was held at the SM Megatrade Hall in SM Megamall from Sept. 27 to 29 from 10:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m. The opening ceremony on Sept. 27 was at 1:00 p.m. Tickets for general admission were priced at P75 while it was P60 for senior citizens. Those who paid through GCash only needed to pay P50.
