Daniel Kuperschmid has spent his career helping people discover exceptional places, first through three decades with Hyatt Hotels and now as President and CEO of the San Diego Tourism Authority.

Daniel joins No Show to explore what it really takes to steward one of America's most visited destinations, balancing tourism, local communities, government, infrastructure, and long-term city building. We get into:

• Why and how San Diego is evolving its reputation.
• Where the majority of visitors are coming from.
• A tourism ecosystem that has to account for dollars coming in but also for the quality of life of the people who live and work in San Diego.
• The future of the San Diego Convention Center, environmental and social concerns, and the role of Measure C.
• Classy hidden neighborhoods, restaurants, and cultural gems every visitor should experience.
• The power of Comic-Con!

Joff Romoff, Google Cloud's Global Head - Travel & Hospitality, unpacks the real and imagined cultural gaps between Silicon Valley and the hotel industry. We talk how tech companies are asset-light and data-forward, while hoteliers are asset-heavy and still inclined to think of the room, not the customer, as the product.

And, how AI is (very) quickly transforming how travelers get inspired via longer, richer prompts, demand for activity outranking accommodation, and a strong desire to trust the new infrastructure of search. 

But AI's real value is reducing friction, not obliterating human experience. The industry is now in an all-out technology arms race, with OTAs, brands, suppliers, and pretty much everybody else you can think of on the front lines.

Here's one of the clearest conversations you'll hear on why Africa is not a single hotel market, but 54 radically different ones.

W Hospitality's Trevor Ward breaks down the realities behind the continent's booming hotel pipeline, and why local capital, not foreign money, is driving most development. Infrastructure, aviation, politics, and risk perception shape hospitality growth in an environment where optimism and operational reality coexist (and collide).

Trevor is an expert on hotel development, investment appraisals, and operator selection who understands the systems behind the systems behind the systems. Hospitality in those 54 markets is transforming in an unexpected, and impossibly fast, way.

Experiential tourism around sports and music has gone stratospheric. BTS just announced they're back together and going on a world tour, and flights and hotels across 34 cities sold out almost immediately.

Kickstarted by Taylor and Beyoncé, music tourism could go to $9 billion globally by 2030—a 50% jump from 2023. Sports could crack a trillion dollars within a few years, especially with FIFA World Cup games this summer and the 2028 Olympics. Why now, is this a matter of right time, right tech enabling all this?

And speaking of tech, GEO and AI visibility are on travel's mind in a dramatically different way compared to even 3 months ago. AI search no longer shows ten links, it recommends a handful of brands. If your travel brand isn’t one of them, it effectively doesn’t exist.

In this era of brand survival, a new customer’s first interaction with your brand is likely to be through an AI summary. If that summary is impersonal, you will be impossible to find against competitors with more emotionally resonant content. But what's hype and what's the real thing? We have guesses.

About 71% of active U.S. travelers say they are more likely to travel internationally than they were two years ago. The U.S. has lost half its market share, 10% of global inbound travel to 5%, since 1995. What is happening exactly? We'll give you a couple of guesses...

Also, how does war and regional instability affect travel routes of the major carriers? And when gas prices for airlines go up because of all these wars, who ends up paying? Again, you'll get a few guesses...

But it's not all doom + gloom, we open with how "grocery store tourism" is apparently a thing now? And $22 smoothies aside, that's a good thing.

For 70 years, duty free sat at the intersection of monopoly on concessions, opaque pricing, cross-border tax rules, very captive audiences, and political insulation. Non-aeronautical revenue — retail, food, alcohol, duty free — accounts for roughly 40–60% of total airport revenue at major hubs.

Duty-free shopping existed for a pretty straightforward economic reason: it helps countries capture spending from international travelers. When a traveler leaves a country, the products they buy in the airport are technically exports. Because those goods are leaving the country and won’t be consumed locally, governments allow retailers to remove local taxes like VAT or GST.

But does it still work? And why? Surely you're not saving that much in a system that's only gotten more rigged through the decades. Or ARE you.......

The Nine Freedoms of the Air are one of the most fascinating (and quietly political) frameworks in global aviation. They define what airlines are allowed to do when flying between countries, and they shape everything from ticket prices to whether Dallas gets a nonstop to Dubai.

But look, see, in aviation, freedom's just another word for restrictions with diplomatic paperwork. The Nine Freedoms are the rulebook for who gets to compete, and who gets locked out in a sky full of negotiated corridors.

Matt Cornelius is Executive Vice President of Airports Council International - North America (ACI-NA), and return guest to No Show. The "Airport Whisperer" tells us what are they, what they mean, and why they exist. Plus the return of our favorite word. That's right...it's cabotage!

As President and CEO of Sonoma County Tourism, Claudia Vecchio always has an eye on the delicate balance between tourism growth and community stewardship. No small task in one of the most famous wine-producing regions in the world, a place that set the template for experiential travel.

We talk tourism, California, ecology, how Sonoma excels in the beauty of backroads discovery, the region's long history of artisanal culture, "Wine Country for All of Us," and what travelers want when they head up the 101. Also: Yakov Smirnoff, jazz piano, great beer, and 21 Jump Street.

If the word "creator" were a person, that person would be Tony Lorenz. He is known universally for his work in the global meetings and events sector and his impossibly deep understanding of the event management industry. He lays out the importance of Destination Management Companies (DMCs), entities that focus on on-the-ground logistics and specialized local experiences for travel and major events.

We talk through how they work, what would happen in a world without them, and their future. Also, how events have evolved since 2020, why they are sneakily underrated, and how to measure attendee ROI in a meaningful way.

From the Jersey Shore to the Sunset Strip, the Garden of the Gods to Boston Common, the Eden Roc to the El Capitan, Curator Hotel and Resort Collection has been on an absolute tear, bringing some of the most unique and independent properties in the country together in a groundbreaking collective.

Jennifer Barnwell talks with us about Curator's ROI-first model and value proposition, the "brand or boutique dilemma" for hotel owners, keeping the indie vibe intact, and the human touch versus automation. Plus: robot massages, Parisian adventures, and the special sauce that goes into evaluating properties to join Curator.