6th Annual SuperFam Comes to South Lake Tahoe

Visit California’s annual “California SuperFAM,” in conjunction with British Airways, returns to the Golden State, October 10-17, 2013 for the sixth consecutive year. Sixty travel agents from the United Kingdom and Ireland will get the VIP treatment on this fast-paced, educational and entertaining California familiarization (“fam”) tour. Split into five groups, agents will embark on five different themed itineraries designed to allow them to experience all that California has to offer firsthand – from Southern California and the Desert to the North Coast and High Sierra. The Lake Tahoe Visitors Authority will be hosting one of the groups, Friday, Oct. 11, 2013, showcasing all that the South Shore of Lake Tahoe has to offer, including Emerald Bay, Vikingsholm, Tahoe Sports, Ski Run Marina, Lake Tahoe Resort Hotel, Base Camp Pizza and the Heavenly Village.

“The California SuperFAM program keeps getting bigger and better, and would not be possible without the support of our many destination partners,” said Leona Reed, Senior Director of International Marketing for Visit California. “The SuperFAM has grown to become one of our most effective travel trade programs as it creates passionate California enthusiasts within the UK and Ireland agent community and drives notably increased bookings. And this year we felt it was time to take a fresh approach to curating the itineraries.”
New this year, the itineraries take a thematic approach rather than the original geographic focus, which will allow each group to cover more ground and participating agents will be more closely matched to their area of product specialization. The five themed itineraries include Culinary, Family Fun, Indulgence, Entertainment and Great Outdoors experiences.

Visit California worked with more than 20 destination marketing organizations (tourism boards) throughout the state to produce the five itineraries which incorporate more than 30 hotels, 60+ attractions and more than 40 restaurants in total. The groups converge October 16 during the finale evening party in San Diego, where participating agents will be able to share their tales from the road with each other and find out more about the places they didn’t get to visit from all participating destination representatives.

Agents became eligible to win a place on the SuperFAM by registering their British Airways California bookings and completing Visit California’s “California Expert” online training program for travel agents. The agents will be some of the first to experience British Airways’ new A380 Los Angeles route.

The UK is one of California’s top overseas tourism markets. In 2012, the UK and Ireland combined for over 700,000 visitors to the state who spent more than $900,000 million. Visit California invests approximately $4.5 million annually in the UK and Ireland to fund broadcast, outdoor and digital advertising campaigns, as well as travel trade and media relations.

For real time updates on events, promotions, packages, conditions and events in Tahoe South, The Lake Tahoe Visitors Authority is on Facebook: www.facebook.com/TahoeSouth, Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/TahoeSouth, YouTube: www.youtube.com/LTVA. For Tahoe South information: 1-800-288-2463 or www.tahoesouth.com.