WTM London 2026: Meet World Footprints

World Footprints is heading to WTM London 2026 for the first time.

From November 3–5, World Footprints will be at Excel London as accredited media, connecting with tourism leaders, destinations, travel brands and media from around the world.

WTM London brings together more than 46,000 travel professionals and 4,000 exhibitors representing 180+ countries. For us, the real value of that global gathering is the opportunity to meet the people behind the destinations—and talk about the stories travelers aren’t always hearing.

Destination Storytelling at WTM London 2026

World Footprints has been telling travel stories since 2007. From the beginning, we’ve been drawn to the people, history, traditions, food, music and communities that give destinations their identity.

That has taken us well beyond lists of things to see and do.

We’ve interviewed cultural icons like the late New Orleans chef Leah Chase, explored heritage and history in destinations around the world, and examined everything from community-based tourism to conservation, accessibility and the impact visitors can have on the places they visit.

At WTM, we’re especially interested in meeting tourism boards, destination marketing and management organizations, tourism ministries and their agency partners that want to tell deeper stories about their destinations.

And for international destinations seeking greater visibility in the U.S. travel market, that conversation is particularly important.

Reaching U.S. Travelers Through World Footprints

World Footprints is an award-winning U.S.-based consumer travel media platform with an audience interested in culture, history, responsible tourism, local communities and meaningful travel experiences.

Our storytelling extends across editorial content, podcasting, photography, video, newsletters and social media.

The World Footprints podcast reaches 331,000+ monthly listeners, while our owned channels and third-party publishing relationships provide access to a potential distribution reach of more than 565 million consumers. Publishing relationships that include MSN and McClatchy can also extend the life and reach of selected stories beyond WorldFootprints.com.

We have worked with destinations including New Orleans, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Delaware and Lynchburg, Virginia, developing stories and conversations rooted in the character of those places.

For us, reach is only part of the equation.

A strong destination story should make someone curious. It should introduce a traveler to something—or someone—they didn’t know before. And ideally, it should leave them wanting to understand the place for themselves.

Destination Stewardship and the Future of Tourism

Those ideas increasingly intersect with another important part of our work: destination stewardship.

Tonya Fitzpatrick is the author of Destination Stewardship: Drive Sustainability, Economic Renewal, and Cultural Integrity, which received a Kirkus Reviews Star and includes a foreword by H.S.H. Prince Albert II of Monaco.

At the heart of the book is a relatively simple question: Is tourism merely bringing more people to a destination, or is it helping make that destination stronger?

The answer can involve everything from local economic opportunity and cultural heritage to infrastructure, environmental resilience and whether residents have a meaningful voice in tourism’s future.

Destination stewardship has also been part of Fitzpatrick’s recent industry conversations at ITB Berlin, Destinations International and Cornell Atkinson’s 2026 Climate Week programming.

That makes WTM particularly timely. This year’s conference theme, “Resilience, rebound & reinvention: The next era of global travel,” puts many of those same questions about growth, destinations, resilience and the future of tourism on the table.

Meet World Footprints at WTM London

We’ll be looking for stories at WTM, but we’re also looking for the right partners to tell them with.

World Footprints welcomes conversations with DMOs, tourism boards, tourism ministries, PR and marketing agencies, hotels, airlines, cruise lines and other travel brands interested in destination storytelling, cultural and heritage tourism, podcast collaborations, integrated media campaigns and destination stewardship.

If your destination has a story that deserves more than a quick mention or a pretty photograph, we’d like to hear it.

Attending WTM London 2026? Let’s connect in London.

Interested in working with World Footprints? Explore our partnership opportunities and learn how we work with destinations, tourism organizations and travel brands.

 

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