We try not to get overly political in our coverage, but this missive on Reddit caught my eye. “US tourism officials sound an alarm, saying that tourist flights might sink 70% and could impact up to 140k hospitality jobs and $14B in economic spending.” 

The note goes on to detail (with carefully compiled footnotes) that in Canada alone, in 2024, 20 million Canadian tourists visited the US, spent $20.5 billion, and supported 140,000 US jobs. Other numbers are equally grim. A French travel company reports to Bloomberg that their Europe to US travel bookings are down 25%. The AP reports that tourism experts expect the number of people arriving in the U.S. from abroad to decline by 9.4% this year. That’s almost twice the 5% drop the company forecast at the end of February. United Airlines forecasts a 20% decline in Canadian travel, according to the AP, and says that Accor hotels reported a 25% decline in European summer bookings to the U.S. due to political tensions. Applying for a visa for a show has become a slower, more fraught proposition, and for many, it’s not worth the effort. Shipping and handling costs are scheduled to rise. And certainly government employees in the US are seeing sharply curtailed travel allowances to events. 

And it’s not just travel. Booth construction costs are expected to rise due to 25% tariffs on steel, aluminum, and other materials imported from Canada, Mexico, and China, reports Trade Executive Magazine. They also cite increased costs in transportation and logistics expenses, with tariffs adding 20-25% to imported goods like furniture, fixtures, and equipment. Ultimately, contractors will explore domestic sourcing alternatives, but there will be delays and higher prices. Trade Show Executive goes so far as to say that digital activations and hybrid events may see an uptick again. Skittish vendors are modifying their terms of sale from normal terms like 30 days to 7 just to protect themselves.

The bottom line may be as simple as moving trade show business to European or EMENA countries. And you're likely to see some dusting off those hybrid event systems where those who can’t make it in person can still participate. Also look for a rise in hyper-local intimate events that leave travel out of the equation. Look for local sourcing of materials

Two takeaways: this is going to take a while to sort itself out, and you should plan even earlier for goods to be delivered in this uncertain environment.

Some interesting links to the topic:

• Tourists are Cancelling Trips to the US
• Trumps New Tariffs and the Potential Hit to Travel
• Trumps Tariffs Have Taken Effect — What Now?
• Anger Against Trump is Forecast to Cost the US International Visitors
• US tourism officials sound alarm, tourist flights to US sink 70% and could impact up to 140k hospitality jobs and $14B in economic spending -- Reddit

Follow along with VEG’s impressive Creator Lab at this year’s NAB Show. In addition to having Adobe teach classes on how to use their AI features right in our area, OpusClip will be working on podcasts, and Blackmagic Design will be swinging by with new Rockstars. You can follow us day-by-day with some of the highlights, including an interview with Dhar Mann, a stellar panel of Creator Analysts, including Natalie Jarvey, Jasmine Engberg, Brit Starr and Leslie Morgan. A sharp-as-tacks group of Creator attorneys will provide hours of free legal counsel. Check out a new technique for creating stunning landscapes, and an AI-powered solution to searching through your mounds of video and photos. Learn how to win the algorithm wars as they play out across platforms. And that’s just day 1. We’ll be making tapes and shorts available to all of you, so keep checking NAB’s Instagram page and the Virtual Events Group’s LinkedIn page. 

Who would have predicted that a social media site would become the bargaining chip in a 5 year game of political intrigue? The quick recap: In 2020, President Donald Trump proposed a TikTok ban, citing national security concerns. It was blocked by the courts. Next, the Biden Administration signed a law passed in Congress that ordered TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to sell TikTok to a US-owned company or face a ban. Then, Trump re-ascends to the Presidency in January. But the legislation was inked.  On January 18th, TikTok pre-emptively went dark, just one day before the Congressional ban was supposed to go down. In that slurry of executive orders Trump signed, one was for a 75-day reprieve to seek out a TikTok ownership alternative.  Whelp, those 75 days were up on Saturday, April 5th. But guess what happened next?  Trump extended the search for the perfect deal by another 75 days. And now we’re in a 75-day-at-a-time limbo. Some say Trump may tie TikTok's fate to the tariff wars as a bargaining chip. Others suggest that a partial US ownership, probably doled out to Trump's tech-bro/cronies, may be the answer. The list of potentials that surfaced this week included  AppLovin (backed by casino mogul Steve Wynn), Amazon, Oracle, Blackstone, and Andreessen Horowitz (VC firm). In this version of Trump's Art of the Deal, Bytedance might maintain its secret-sauce algorithm, and the US would be some sort of subsidiary.

Meanwhile, you have to chuckle (or cry) because the US Defense Department has been planning its top secret warfare on a group chat on Signal, an over-the-counter platform often used by some questionable businesses, even as it obsesses over the thought of the Chinese infiltrating sensitive information in a pretty transparent world of videos. And guaranteed TikTok drama will find its way to the big screen, small screen, and every other screen where stories of intrigue are told.

CES 2025 Redux
Our good friends at VIPNetMedia spent a good chunk of time in the Creator Space we built at this year’s #CES2025. Watch the interviews with Dahlia El Ghazzar, Dhar Mann, Eric Shamlin, Gigi Robinson and others.