Eligibility Guidelines

ESTO - Where Destinations Grow

The Educational Seminar for Tourism Organizations (ESTO) is the premier annual learning and knowledge-sharing forum for destination management professionals. It is unique in that it is created by and exclusively for this specific target audience. ESTO is not open to other industry sectors and, with the exception of a limited number of official ESTO sponsors whose significant contributions support a variety of ESTO activities, no allied organizations or service providers may attend.

ESTO is the place where destination professionals go to learn about new tools and techniques, share best practices, and debate pressing issues affecting destinations in a non-sales environment. It is the place “Where Destinations Grow.”

Who Can Attend?

You are eligible to attend ESTO if you are a State Tourism Director, CEO, or professional staff from:

• State and Territory Tourism Offices
• Convention and Visitors Bureaus and Chambers of Commerce
• Regional Tourism Marketing Organizations
• Statewide Tourism Industry Associations

Agency of Record Representatives Attendance Policy

U.S. Travel Association understands that some state tourism offices and DMOs view their agency of record as an extension of their staff and would therefore be beneficial for the agency to attend ESTO to learn and engage in discussions that will help them better serve their client.

The agency of record must be under contract/retainer for advertising or marketing services. The attending representative must be in an account manager capacity and specifically assigned to the state/destination client.

The program is NOT designed nor allowed for business development purposes. Job titles that include business development, new business, publisher or executive staff (president, CEO, vice president, chief operating officer, etc) are typically not the key account managers and are not allowed to attend ESTO under this policy.

Agencies and firms that serve multiple states and/or DMO clients (national in scope) should consider participating at ESTO as a sponsor. For sponsorship information please contact Malcolm Smith at msmith@ustravel.org.

To ensure the program is not misused, U.S. Travel has instituted an application process. The agency applicant must have a sponsor state tourism office or DMO and both parties must adhere to the following criteria:

• The state tourism office or DMO initiates the application process, receives signature from the agency signifying that both parties consent to the ESTO Attendance Policy, and submits the application to U.S. Travel for review (application is not a guarantee of attendance).
• The account representative clearly understands the attendance policy and agrees not to solicit business from other states or DMOs nor entertain ESTO delegates during the event.
• Each state tourism office or DMO may bring a maximum of two agency representatives to ESTO.
• If a state or DMO elects to bring two representatives to ESTO, the two representatives must work for different agencies. Exceptions may be made on a case-by-case basis.
• The state tourism office or DMO client must attend ESTO in order for the agency representative to attend.
• Agencies attending ESTO may represent no more than two state tourism office and/or DMO clients at the conference.
• Approved account representatives will have the sponsoring state tourism office or DMO name on their name badge.
• Deadline to submit applications for consideration is July 27, 2012.

U.S. Travel reserves the right to refuse attendance to any ESTO agency representative applicant.

Download ESTO Agency Representative Application

If you have questions or need additional information:

call (202) 408-8422
e-mail ncstd@ustravel.org or ncdo@ustravel.org

Note: Allied organizations or service providers wishing to attend ESTO, should contact Malcolm Smith to explore sponsorship and advertising opportunities:

Malcolm Smith
Vice President of Business Development
(202) 408-2141
msmith@ustravel.org.