You’re standing in the lobby of a hotel in Lloret de Mar at 8:47 AM, lanyard around your neck, coffee in hand, and zero idea where to go first. The app shows three simultaneous sessions — SEO, Instagram monetization, pitching tourism boards — and a breakfast networking event that started ten minutes ago. This is TBEX. And for most first-timers, the first two hours set the tone for whether the whole trip pays off.
I went to TBEX Costa Brava expecting a conference. I got something closer to a speed-dating marathon with occasional PowerPoints. Here’s what actually happened, what I got wrong, and what I’d do differently if I walked in tomorrow.
What Actually Happens at TBEX and Why Day One Matters Most
TBEX — Travel Bloggers Exchange — runs over two or three days. The format mixes keynote sessions, breakout workshops, and structured networking blocks called speed networking, where you rotate through tables and pitch your blog to tourism board reps, PR agencies, and destination sponsors in timed rounds.
Costa Brava suited the event well. The venue in Lloret de Mar kept everything centralized, which sounds like a small detail until you’ve attended a conference spread across three separate buildings and a secondary convention center. Sessions ran roughly 9 AM to 6 PM, with the headline networking event on Day One evening. That evening event is where the real conference happens. More on that shortly.
How the session tracks break down
Sessions at TBEX split into two tracks: one focused on building audience and monetization, one aimed at bloggers already pitching brands and destinations. Under a year of blogging? Track One is your lane. Already working with tourism boards and holding an active media kit? Spend most of your time in the sponsor hall and the hallway, not in sessions. The sponsor hall — where tourism boards from Spain, Portugal, Croatia, Malta, and the Canary Islands set up booths — is where deals actually get made.
Speed networking: the format that defines TBEX
Structured speed networking runs in timed rounds. You sit across from a tourism board rep or PR contact, have roughly three to five minutes to introduce yourself and describe your audience, then a bell rings and you rotate.
The pitch that fails every time: “I’m a travel blogger with 20,000 monthly readers.” That tells a destination rep nothing actionable. The pitch that works: “I write for an audience of 35-55 year old American women planning their first trips to southern Europe, and my last Croatia feature drove 4,000 clicks to the Croatian National Tourist Board’s website in three weeks.” That gets a business card and a follow-up calendar invite. Specificity is the whole game.
| TBEX Day | Main Activity | Where to Focus Your Energy |
|---|---|---|
| Day One (morning) | Registration, opening keynote, first sessions | Sponsor hall — introduce yourself before it gets crowded |
| Day One (evening) | Welcome reception and networking event | The highest-value hour of the entire conference. Be here. |
| Day Two (morning) | Speed networking rounds | Have your numbers memorized. Know your niche cold. |
| Day Two (afternoon) | Sessions and FAM trip sign-up desks | FAM trip desks — slots fill fast, go early |
| Day Three | FAM trips and optional excursions | Go. These press trips are often the real ROI of attending. |
The Networking Mistake That Cost Me Three Press Trip Opportunities
I spent Day One in sessions. Wrong call.
The sessions were genuinely good — useful content on technical SEO and affiliate structure — but nothing I couldn’t have gotten from a well-produced podcast. The press trip invitations, the business cards from Malta Tourism and Visit Portugal, the dinner invite from a boutique hotel group in the Costa Brava region: every single one of those came from conversations in hallways, at the coffee station, and at the welcome reception. I missed the reception because I was finishing notes from a panel discussion about Pinterest algorithms.
Go to the reception. Skip a session if you have to. There is no single hour at TBEX more valuable than the first-evening networking event. Tourism board reps are relaxed, they aren’t fielding ten simultaneous pitches, and the informal setting makes actual conversation possible. I learned this on Day Two. By then, some of the most useful contacts had already identified who they wanted to work with.
How to Build a Media Kit That Opens Doors Before You Arrive
Every serious attendee at TBEX has a one-page media kit. Most of them are bad. Yours doesn’t have to be.
A travel blogger’s media kit should fit on a single PDF page. Build it in Canva (free tier works fine) or Adobe Express. The Canva Pro plan runs $15/month and unlocks more premium templates, but the free version has enough layouts to produce something clean and credible.
What belongs on your media kit
- Your name, blog name, and URL — large, at the top
- Monthly unique visitors pulled from Google Analytics 4 (screenshot it if reps want to verify)
- Email list size and average open rate
- Top three traffic sources: search, social, referral
- Audience demographics: age range, top countries, gender split
- Instagram and Pinterest follower counts with average reach per post — not just follower totals
- Two or three past collaborations with measurable results: “Visit Iceland FAM trip → 12,000 pageviews in 30 days”
- A headshot and two or three strong sample images from your work
- A professional contact email — not a Gmail address from 2009
What kills a media kit immediately
No numbers. Or numbers without context. “50,000 Instagram followers” means nothing if your engagement rate is 0.3%. A blogger with 8,000 followers and a 6% engagement rate is more attractive to a regional tourism board than an account with inflated numbers and no real reader relationship. Reps at TBEX see hundreds of media kits. The ones that get flagged are specific.
Print ten copies. Bring a QR code that links to the digital PDF. Some reps still take paper; others want to scan. Use Notion (free) to log who you gave it to, when, and any follow-up details — otherwise you’re combing through a stack of business card photos three days after you land home.
Send it before you arrive
TBEX publishes a list of attending sponsors weeks before the conference opens. Email the ones relevant to your niche at least two weeks out. Keep the email under 100 words. Attach the PDF. State that you’ll be at TBEX and would like to connect in person.
This worked for me once out of six attempts — which sounds like a poor rate until you consider what that one connection became: a five-day press trip to Montenegro the following spring, three published features, and an ongoing relationship with a PR firm that books me for one FAM trip a year. One email.
Budget and Accommodation: What TBEX Costa Brava Actually Costs
Most recap posts skip the money part. Here it is plainly.
| Expense | Estimated Cost (2026) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| TBEX conference ticket | $199–$349 USD | Early bird pricing opens 3-4 months before the event |
| Flights to Girona or Barcelona | $400–$900 USD round trip from North America | Vueling and Ryanair serve Girona (GRO) — often cheaper than BCN |
| Accommodation (3 nights, Lloret de Mar) | €90–€180 per night | Book the conference hotel block early — it sells out |
| Ground transport (Girona to Lloret de Mar) | €12–€45 | Direct bus from Girona bus station: ~€12. Taxi from Barcelona El Prat: €45+ |
| Meals (not covered by conference) | €25–€50 per day | The conference covers some lunches — check the schedule in advance |
| Total estimated trip cost | $1,400–$2,200 USD | Varies based on flight origin and how early you book accommodation |
The conference hotel is almost always the right call, even when it costs more than a nearby Airbnb. The hallway conversations at 10 PM are part of the conference. Being fifteen minutes away means you miss them.
I stayed at a smaller property about 800 meters from the venue to save money. Saved roughly €60 over three nights. Missed two impromptu dinners that I heard about the next morning over breakfast. Not math I’d run again.
Flying into Girona (GRO) instead of Barcelona (BCN) is usually the better move for Costa Brava-area events. The direct bus from Girona’s bus station to Lloret de Mar runs about €12. A taxi from Barcelona El Prat will run €45 or more before you’ve even started the trip.
What to Bring and What to Leave at the Hotel
Bring these
A compact portable charger. The Anker PowerCore 10000 (~$25) is the right size for a conference — small enough to carry all day, enough capacity to keep your phone alive through a full schedule. The larger Anker 737 (26,800mAh, ~$70) is more power than you need and noticeably heavier in a shoulder bag.
Business cards. Yes, still. Get 50 printed through Vistaprint for under $15. QR codes work. Some reps will still reach for a card. Have both options ready.
A small notebook. The Leuchtturm1917 A6 pocket notebook (~$18) fits in a jacket pocket and lets you jot notes while standing without creating the visual barrier that a laptop does. Open laptops at networking events signal “I’m not fully present.”
Leave these behind
Your full camera kit. A mirrorless body with two lenses sounds like the obvious move for a travel conference in coastal Catalonia. In practice: you’ll take forty photos of booth signage and session slides, then carry 1.5kg of gear for three days with nothing to show for it. Bring a phone with a capable camera — the iPhone 16 Pro or Google Pixel 9 Pro are both fine for conference use — and save the serious camera work for the FAM trips, where you’ll actually have time and light to shoot properly.
Also leave behind: the overscheduled session plan. Two sessions per day, maximum. Spend the rest of your time talking to people. That’s the product you paid for.
Who Should Skip TBEX and Who Should Book Right Now
Under 5,000 monthly unique visitors and no defined niche? Wait. Tourism boards at TBEX want creators with a specific audience in a specific category — adventure travel, family travel, luxury, culinary, budget backpacking. A general lifestyle blog with thin traffic will struggle in the sponsor hall, and you’ll leave frustrated rather than with leads. That frustration isn’t the conference’s fault; it’s a timing mismatch.
But if you have a focused niche, 10,000 or more monthly visitors, and at least one prior brand collaboration on your CV, TBEX is worth the investment. The FAM trips alone — often included or heavily subsidized for accepted bloggers — can offset most of your trip costs. One well-executed press trip feature, if it ranks in search, will generate traffic and partnership opportunities long after the conference badge goes in a drawer.
The bloggers who get the most out of TBEX aren’t necessarily the biggest names in the room. They’re the most prepared. They arrive with a sharp pitch, a clean media kit, and a short list of three to five destinations they genuinely want to cover next. That specificity is what gets a tourism board rep to pull out their phone and add your contact before the speed networking bell rings.
Travel blogger conferences are quietly getting more selective — and that shift is working in favor of creators who treat the work seriously. The gap between a blogger who shows up and a blogger who shows up prepared is wider than it’s ever been, and the destinations on the other side of the table can tell the difference in about ninety seconds.