PATA Launches Digital Showroom and Online Community for Travel Professionals

Bangkok, Thailand, December 8, 2020 / TRAVELINDEX / The Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) is pleased to announce the launch of PATA Marketplace, a digital showroom exclusive for PATA members and an online community for all travel industry stakeholders.

The announcement was made earlier today by PATA CEO Dr. Mario Hardy during the Association’s first hybrid event, under the theme “Asia Pacific Tourism Recovery Trends & Outlook” and organised in partnership with the Thailand Convention and Exhibition Bureau (TCEB) and the Sindhorn Kempinski Hotel Bangkok.

“PATA is committed to growing our members business by embracing digital technology to enable strong partnerships, particularly as we look towards recovery post COVID-19. The additional benefit for our members allows them to network and engage with each other and other travel stakeholders all year round, instead of just at our events,” said Dr. Hardy. “Over the past few years, the Association has had to adapt, be agile and be creative in order to serve the best interests of our members and the industry as a whole, and the PATA Marketplace is just a natural extension of this mission.”

As a digital showroom, PATA members are invited to showcase their company profile and products at the Marketplace by creating a complimentary exhibitor profile. It only takes a few minutes to set up a profile and exhibitors can update their own profiles anytime; publish news, products and services, and videos; and connect with visitors via one-to-one chat, audio or video calls in a single click.

The PATA Marketplace allows exhibitors to keep its “followers” updated on news, announcements, and blog posts; get notified of customers’ requests that match their profile; easily share exhibitor profiles with relevant stakeholders by email or social media; showcase their products year round as a PATA member, and increase their brand exposure.

As a online community for all travel industry stakeholders, all travel buyers and industry professionals are invited to join as a visitor to find new travel suppliers and products; participate in chat groups and discussion; discover and connect with new travel suppliers and products which can be filtered by destination and hashtag; submit proposals, and “follow” exhibitors to keep abreast of their latest news and updates.

PATA Marketplace is powered by PATA Tech Partner, FeedsFloor, a digital platform that helps small & medium-sized companies connect with new customers, distributors and suppliers in an easy, affordable and digital way. FeedsFloor, established in 2017 and based in Copenhagen, Denmark, serves over 100,000 members from 140 countries across 27 industries.

About PATA
Founded in 1951, the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) is a not-for-profit membership association that acts as a catalyst for the responsible development of travel and tourism to, from and within the Asia Pacific region. The Association provides aligned advocacy, insightful research and innovative events to its more than 750 member organisations, including 84 government, state and city tourism bodies, 14 international airlines and airports, 81 hospitality organisations and 77 educational institutions, as well as thousands of young tourism professional (YTP) members across the world. The PATA network also embraces the grassroots activism the PATA Chapters and Student Chapters, who organise numerous travel industry training programmes and business development events across the world. Thousands of travel professionals belong to the 32 local PATA Chapters worldwide, while hundreds of students are members of the 26 PATA Student Chapters globally. The PATA mPOWER platform delivers unrivalled data, forecasts and insights to members’ desktops and mobile devices anywhere in the world. PATA’s Head Office has been in Bangkok since 1998. The Association also has official offices or representation in Beijing and London. PATA’s Annual Theme for the 2020 calendar year is ‘Partnerships for Tomorrow’.