CEO of the Guadalajara Convention & Visitors Bureau, Gustavo Staufert Buclon introduces us to the multiple facets of the beguiling city and reveals its plans for sustainability and festivities.
Q&A WITH GUSTAVO STAUFERT BUCLON, CEO, GUADALAJARA CONVENTION & VISITORS BUREAU
Dedicated to promoting tourism and business travel, the Guadalajara Convention & Visitors Bureau (CVB) plays a crucial role in boosting the city’s economy by providing various resources and services for tourists and business travellers. The CVB is tasked with hosting, organising, and funding events, conventions, and congresses. Indeed, founded in 1970, it was the first in Latin America to engage in the procurement of congresses and conventions.
How does the CVB engage with the city’s tourism sector and what particular areas would you recommend to visitors?
Gustavo Staufert Buclon, CEO (GSB): The bureau is made up of different segments, the first two of which are the meetings, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions (MICE) business. Regarding MICE, we work with pharmaceutical and medical congresses, trade shows, and exhibitions, alongside the IT sector, which is very important for Guadalajara since the city is known as the ‘Silicon Valley’ of Latin America. Moreover, FIL is held here, which is the second-largest in size only to the Frankfurt Book Fair and caters to other languages. As an exhibition destination, we must, therefore, have a good relationship with our supply chain to host the different congresses.
Sports are essential for Guadalajara because it was the venue for the XVI Pan American Games in 2011. As such, we have developed many sports competitions with the infrastructure. Guadalajara is also one of the few cities that will become the host of the FIFA World Cup in 2026 for the third time, providing a venue for the event.
Additionally, we belong to the BestCities Global Alliance, a collaboration of 13 premier convention bureaus that creates a positive impact through business events.
Furthermore, we were awarded by World Physiotherapy and the International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), which is also taking place in Guadalajara. Moreover, last year, we won the world’s second-largest medical congress, the World Congress of Dermatology, which was held in Singapore in November last year and will take place in 2027 in Guadalajara.
How do you market Guadalajara’s history and culture while promoting its position as the “Silicon Valley of Mexico”?
GSB: We like to say that Guadalajara is traditionally modern because it has two different ends of the rope. It began as a public policy in the 1970s, which encouraged companies such as Kodak and Motorola to settle here, followed by IBM and Hewlett-Packard. The dimensions and size of organisations are vital to Guadalajara, as more prominent companies such as Flex, Continental Automotive, Sanmina Corporation, and Benchmark Electronics are all large enough to contain many micro-entities related to IT. With that in mind, a Ministry of Innovation was developed to utilise the expertise of these organisations to create programmes for the country’s engineering universities.
By running these programmes, each company is showing its commitment to society, as every engineer who graduates from the scheme immediately has a job in one of the respective IT businesses. Having developed this initiative over the last 50 years, the Ministry of Innovation can forecast which conventions or congresses should be interesting for the industry. Occasionally, we relate the initiative with other sectors. For example, when the International Society for the Performing Arts (ISPA) came to Guadalajara, it worked with our IT companies to develop digital arts. This often happens when different conferences interact.
Are there any upcoming projects or investments that you feel are significant and would like to highlight?
GSB: In order to cater to over 20 million passengers, Guadalajara International Airport (GDL) is currently in the middle of an essential expansion, including the development of new routes. In 2026, we’ll have about 26 million passengers, and in 2030, we’ll be able to host 32 million people, making the airport our most important investment. Two years ago, we opened a direct flight to Madrid, Spain, which was very successful, seeing a 90 percent occupancy rate. We have also inaugurated direct flights to Vancouver, and in July, we’ll be able to offer a direct flight to Toronto.
Possessing the second-largest airport in the country, Guadalajara has the most significant number of routes. Regarding international passengers, we are third behind Mexico City and Cancun, and for national passengers, we are once again just behind the capital city. However, now that the airport in Mexico City is narrowing and GDL is in the middle of the expansion, we think these numbers might change shortly; that kind of mobility is important, along with all the nearshoring and expectations it brings.
Why, in your opinion, should someone visit Guadalajara? What defines the city, and what types of travellers does it appeal to?
GSB: The city appeals to those who seek tradition and modernity simultaneously. Our traditions are robust and involve Mexican icons that are known around the world. Tequila is the second most familiar aspect of the country, and yet, it is not only a beverage but also a town around 40 minutes away from Guadalajara, where you will see the great expanse of agave-filled fields that are UNESCO World Heritage Sites on the way. Additionally, you also have the mariachi band, born in Jalisco; we have the International Mariachi Festival every year, occurring from the last week of August to the first week of September, as mariachis come here to specialise and compete. The event is vital to the Expo Guadalajara convention centre and the promotion of the city in different countries. For example, there are mariachis across Japan in Tokyo and Osaka, who we hire for their singing ability. Therefore, people travel from across the world to Guadalajara to visit the International Mariachi Festival.
Travellers can also visit the ancient towns and haciendas where it feels like time has stopped, and they can see precisely how Guadalajara was 500 years ago. One such experience is Charrería, showcasing the Mexican Charro, a cowboy from Guadalajara who demonstrates the artistry and primal poetry of the sport, which features horse-riding competitions and traditional, elegant attire.
Similar to the whole of Mexico, Guadalajara is full of festivities; it is a colourful city that is part of a colourful country. These thrilling events have made us famous in the world of congresses, as has Guadalajara’s cuisine, which is abundant with flavour and crucial to the city’s identity.
We are almost three hours from Puerto Vallarta, which has the most famous beaches in Jalisco and possesses a range of luxury hotels for visitors, including the Four Seasons Resort and many other all-inclusive hotels. Puerto Vallarta is unlike Cancun and often described as a Mexican all-flavour town, which is very appealing.
What are some of the city’s most unique historical landmarks?
GSB: Fascinatingly, Guadalajara had to be founded four times! Unlike many parts of Mexico, which already had an original city, Guadalajara was built from the ground up. However, since there were many nomadic tribes at war, deciding where to establish the town often changed until Valentine’s Day of 1542, when they decided to remain where we are now. Upon its initial founding, there was great debate about whether to colonise the city. Eventually, Beatriz Hernández established the city after confronting the male-dominated colonisers, proclaiming that the spot should be their final location and women should also be able to build the settlement. Therefore, I always encourage feminist groups to demonstrate next to her statue because she deserves to be a role model for every woman in the world.
The city has some notable talent and a prominent lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and queer (LGBTIQ+) community. Would you say these factors are part of Guadalajara’s legacy for future generations?
GSB: The whole state is crucial for the LGBTIQ+ community. The city wanted to follow the example set by Puerto Vallarta, which established a policy long ago. Therefore, to boost the gay community, I visited John Tanzella, the President of the LGBTIQ+ Travel Association (IGLTA) and asked him for advice on how I could sincerely develop Guadalajara’s LGBTIQ+ community. He told me about the Gay Games, a worldwide sporting event that promotes diversity, which subsequently took place in Guadalajara last year. Additionally, we have previously hosted InterPride – an international organisation that brings together the global Pride network.
I am ecstatic about the fact that the people of our city are very open to our work with the LGBTIQ+ community. We were blown away by the enthusiastic reception and support the Gay Games 2023 received from all corners of society.
What eco-friendly tourism adventures does Guadalajara offer, and how does sustainability shape the city and industry?
GSB: Sustainability is a very important topic nowadays. When bidding to become a member of the BestCities Global Alliance, our weakest link was the lack of sustainability within our MICE business. Therefore, to rectify this, we began working with the Global Destinations Sustainability (GDS) movement, which has successfully worked with the BestCities Global Alliance in the past. We decided to begin with a fashion exhibition, as this particular sector is not recognised as being eco-friendly. We believed it would also generate a lot of positive press for both the alliance and the city and make what we were doing more visible. It was a big challenge for both parties, but we now work well with the legacy.
We discovered that the carpets used across our events were one of the most polluting parts of the MICE business, particularly as these exhibitions are critical to Guadalajara. Therefore, we contacted Montecolino, an Italian company that makes a single-use carpet that, once used, is recycled into plastic pellets, which can be utilised in new industrial applications. Of course, it is about 20 percent more expensive than regular carpeting, so the convention centre and the CVB decided that we would pay 50 percent of that amount on behalf of the company doing the trade shows in order to make it more cost-effective. Now, the carpet looks neat and new with high-resolution colours without hurting the environment. Moreover, the convention centre uses less energy due to solar power generation and uses a rain mix for potable water for the restrooms. We’re moving rapidly with regards to sustainability; we went from having nothing to now having robust environmental practices and will continue to climb.
Are you optimistic about the future of the tourism industry in Guadalajara?
GSB: We’re very excited because we are reaping the benefits of all the hard work that we are doing. Last year, we had a 25 percent increase in business from the year before, which had a growth rate of six percent compared to 2019. Of course, we want another 25 percent increase this year, but six or seven percent is good. However, we’ll continue to grow in the following years with our world-class events in Guadalajara. I’m sure we’ll be able to keep getting better through our evolving tourism sector and deliver on our founder’s vision in 1970 to develop the first CVB in Latin America.
