ESSENCE 2026

Dear Members and Partners, Serandipians and Takumians,

I would like to thank the many Partners and Members who attended Essence of Phuket in March 2025, Panama in May 2025 and Sardinia in September 2025. Our new 2025 international Essence format was acclaimed by a vast majority of our Members and Partners through the survey we did in 2024 and the success of registrations in 2025.

This international format matches our singularity, recognising us as the most geographically diverse luxury travel network community.

We invite you to continue this adventure with us in 2026, as we will keep discovering these marvelous destinations. Essence of Phuket will take place from the 2nd to 6th of March, followed by Essence of Panama from the 18th to 22nd of May, and Essence of Sardinia from the 5th to 9th of October.

Our programme is meticulously crafted to ensure Partner suppliers can conveniently meet Members from across the globe within their respective regions :
- Asia, the Middle East, and the Pacific for Phuket;
- North, South America and the Caribbean for Panama;
- Europe & Africa for Sardinia.

Our Member Travel Designers have expressed an insatiable desire to travel around the world to explore new destinations and meet our Partners on the three continents, resulting in a balanced representation of all our Members worldwide at each of the three shows. Many of them will arrive earlier to join local famtrips in the regions.

We highly recommend that you plan your arrival before the events to enjoy the destination. We have negotiated good hotel rates for our Partners & Members on Saturday and Sunday upon availability.

We can’t wait to see you there in 2026!

Quentin Desurmont
& The Traveller Made team

HIGHLIGHTS

The situation for the coming months remains unclear: Nobody knows if, when and how many travel industry professionals will travel again to attend shows. This could lead to a smaller event with 30% to 60% less participants. We expect new physical distancing rules that could prevent us from having as many people as planned in 2020. Other unforeseeable external factors could impact our show and the travel industry. For these many reasons, we have adapted our 2021 event as both a physical and a virtual show, to deliver the important relationship-building opportunities which are essential for business development in our industry, now more than ever.

New – The Essence becomes a hybrid show There will be two Essence shows in 2021: The physical show will be held in Marbella from Monday 19^th to Friday 23^rd of April. The Virtual show will be held worldwide from Monday 31^st of May to Friday 4^th of June.
Members and Partners will have the opportunity to apply to both events. Invitations to apply to the virtual show will be sent in 2021.

Appointment preferences Members and Partners will be asked to give positive and negative preferences during the selection process, to optimize their meetings.

New – Appointment ratings Members and Partners will be asked to rate each of their meetings in their personal account.

New – Mobile application forum Members and Partners will have the opportunity to discuss with all participants on the mobile Application’s forum.

New – Accommodation Participants to the 2021 Marbella Essence show will express their preferred hotel choice and the organiser will do its best to confirm it during the validation process on a first registered, first served basis.

Member Agents commitment When registering to The Essence of Luxury Travel show, every agent must commit to attend the 4 days and to appoint a replacement agent in case of a last-minute impediment to join.
No shows and agents who are not replaced will score negative points in the Certification Programme.

DMC Certification For the third year, we will celebrate the DMC Champions who were the best at using the key Traveller Made tools.

Hotel Partners Certification For the fourth year, we will celebrate the Partners’ Traveller Made Champions who were the best at using the key Traveller Made tools.

Members Certification For the fifth year, we will celebrate the Travel Designers who were the best at using the key Traveller Made tools.

NEW - Member Agents fees Member Agents that will have received a 1^st Gold Grand Designer and a 1^st Grand Designer 2021 Certification in January, will be able to attend the show for free. Other Members will have to pay 300€ to attend the show. This revenue will be invested in creating additional training tools for 2^nd, 3^rd Certified Grand Designer and non-Certified Member Agents.

Partners high definition photo and video material Partners will be invited to post all their HD pictures and videos on our Content Platform prior to the show. No need for paper and USB keys anymore. Members will be able to immediately promote a product they like by sharing the link with their team.

One-to-One meetings 10 minute meetings will start at 9 a.m. and end at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.

FOR PARTNERS, THERE WILL BE A TOTAL OF 90 ONE-TO-ONE MEETINGS & MEMBERS WILL HAVE AROUND 100 ONE-TO-ONE MEETINGS INCLUDING INFORMAL ONES WHICH WILL TAKE PLACE IN THE MEETINGS BALLROOM.

Conference Powered by the Luxury Travel Lab, our conference will continue to address key luxury topics to inspire our community. They have started to review the 2021 theme of our conference in Marbella. The Luxury Travel Lab now includes over 35 experts of the luxury goods and service industries in France and England.

The Closing Party After the “Red Party”, held on a private cruise boat along the shores of Lake Geneva in 2015, the “Mountaineers Party” held in a barn on the hills of Lausanne in 2016, the “Movie Star Party” and the “Mother Nature Party” held at the Barriere Casino in Deauville in 2017 and 2018, and after the «Galactic Party» held at the Puente Romano hotel in 2019, the “Utopia Party” that didn’t happen in 2020, the Traveller Made party will be held on Thursday 22^nd of April.
Theme to be revealed early 2021.

The Essence Gala Held on Monday evening April 19^th, the Gala will take the shape of a cocktail or seated dinner show depending on the local authorizations where we will feature the Creative Peak theme and celebrate the 2021 Award winners.

2 free evenings Tuesday 20^th and Wednesday 21^st of April will remain free for Partners to invite their chosen Member Agents. The list of Members participating will be provided to those Partners who organize events.

Previous Essence shows

Press Schedule

The Essence - Marbella

Day 1: Sunday, September 27th

Afternoon	«The Essence of Luxury» Press Conference
Evening	Dinner

Day 2: Monday, September 28th

Morning	Interviews with our Members & Partners
Afternoon	Visit of Marbella area
Evening	The Essence Gala & The Awards Ceremony

Day 3: Tuesday, September 29th

Morning	Visit our One-to-One meetings & Galeria de Canalejas booth
Lunch
Afternoon	Departure

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VIRTUAL SHOW

420 amongst you all already know how it works.
We will repeat the winning recipe with a few improvements.
In 2021 we will bring the one-to-one meetings and the conference in one week.

HIGHLIGHTS

Previous Essence shows

Press Schedule

The Essence - Marbella

VIRTUAL SHOW

420 amongst you all already know how it works. We will repeat the winning recipe with a few improvements. In 2021 we will bring the one-to-one meetings and the conference in one week.

HIGHLIGHTS

Previous Essence shows

Press Schedule

The Essence - Marbella

Login

420 amongst you all already know how it works.
We will repeat the winning recipe with a few improvements.
In 2021 we will bring the one-to-one meetings and the conference in one week.