Five Decades Across the Global Travel and Tourism Industry
For five decades, Juergen T. Steinmetzhas lived and worked across virtually every corner of the global travel and tourism industry.
His career has taken him from organizing student travel and escorting tour groups across Europe to negotiating airline contracts, operating inbound tourism programs, managing vacation rentals, representing international destinations, building a global travel media organization, working in tourism security and crisis communications, advising tourism organizations and governments, and bringing together tourism leaders and professionals from more than 100 countries.
Along the way, Steinmetz has built relationships with generations of people who have shaped international tourism—from government ministers, tourism board executives and leaders of international organizations to airline executives, hotel owners, tour operators, travel agents, journalists and entrepreneurs.
Many of the industry’s current and former movers and shakers know him personally. Others know him through eTurboNews, the global travel-industry publication he founded; through his extensive professional and LinkedIn networks; or through the international tourism organizations and initiatives he has helped create.
What distinguishes Steinmetz’s career is that it did not develop within one narrow segment of tourism.
He has been a travel organizer, tour guide, travel agent, airline consolidator, destination representative, inbound operator, accommodation operator, publisher, consultant, crisis-communications specialist, association founder and international tourism networker.
It is a career built from the ground up.
The Beginning: Montreal 1976
Born on December 9, 1957, in Germany, Steinmetz received his first taste of the travel business while still a teenager and student.
Travel was initially connected to sports. He began organizing trips for his sports club, including a memorable journey during the summer of 1976 when he organized travel for members of his swimming club to Montreal during the Olympic Games.
What began as an enthusiasm quickly developed into practical experience.
After establishing a relationship with a U.S. tour company, Steinmetz spent school and college vacations organizing and guiding groups of American travelers through Germany and neighboring European countries.
Long before tourism became his formal profession, he was already learning some of its most important lessons: how travelers behave, how groups operate, how itineraries work and how destinations are experienced differently by visitors and residents.
Hapag-Lloyd and the Professional Travel Industry
After college, Steinmetz joined Hapag-Lloyd in Düsseldorf.
His work exposed him to another side of the business: cruises, tour sales and land arrangements. He organized and sold land tours, particularly programs involving Morocco, participated in cruises and escorted groups through Europe.
Among his assignments was accompanying passengers from Rome—the final stop on their cruise journey—back to Düsseldorf.
The experience added cruise operations, ground handling and organized tour management to an increasingly broad understanding of tourism.
Building an Airline Consolidation Business
Steinmetz soon moved from employee to entrepreneur.
He established what became one of Germany’s early airline consolidation operations. Starting with a young team that included friends and associates, he negotiated contracts with dozens of major international airlines and developed a substantial business selling international airline tickets, primarily through travel agencies. Thousands of tickets were sold.
The business gave Steinmetz direct exposure to airline distribution, agency sales, international fares, airline negotiations and the economics underlying the rapidly expanding international travel market.
It also began building the international airline and travel-agency relationships that would remain important throughout his career.
Hawaii, Korea and the Opening of a New Tourism Market
Steinmetz eventually relocated to the United States and made Hawaii his home.
In Honolulu, he established an inbound travel operation at an extraordinary moment in the development of South Korean outbound tourism.
When South Korea began liberalizing overseas travel and issuing passports more broadly, Steinmetz recognized the opportunity. His company became involved in organizing some of the first group travel programs bringing South Korean visitors to Hawaii.
He traveled repeatedly to Korea, while in Hawaii he negotiated arrangements with hotels, transportation companies and other tourism suppliers.
The operation required an understanding of two very different markets and cultures at a time when Korean outbound tourism was only beginning to emerge as a major international force. The business continued until it was ultimately taken over by a larger company.
Vacation Rentals and Hawaii Hospitality
Steinmetz subsequently expanded into Hawaii’s accommodation sector. He developed a successful vacation-rental operation responsible for more than 200 units, primarily in Waikiki, on Oahu’s North Shore and on Maui.
The company was not simply a booking operation. It handled the practical ecosystem surrounding vacation rentals, including marketing, sales, reservations, guest services, property coordination and cleaning.
This gave Steinmetz direct operational experience in hospitality and destination accommodation—experience considerably different from observing the industry from a corporate office.
As Hawaii introduced increasing restrictions affecting short-term vacation rentals, the business eventually merged with another company.
Garuda Indonesia and a New Chapter
Another major chapter began with Garuda Indonesia. Steinmetz built a business around an allocation of 48 seats on every Garuda flight between the United States and Bali.
His company packaged the air capacity with hotels, tours, and ground arrangements throughout Indonesia and marketed the programs to travelers in the United States.
The operation attracted travel-industry and consumer-media attention, including coverage in Frommer’s and other publications. When Garuda discontinued its U.S. flights, Steinmetz’s relationship with Indonesia did not end.
Instead, it evolved.
He was appointed to represent Indonesia Tourism in the United States and Canada on behalf of the country’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
For approximately three years, Steinmetz worked to promote one of the world’s largest and most diverse destinations to the North American travel market.
That assignment would inadvertently lead to perhaps the most consequential development of his career.
A Travel Advisory, Yahoo Groups and the Accidental Birth of an Online Publisher
When the United States issued travel advisories affecting Indonesia, Steinmetz faced a communications problem familiar to destination marketers.
How could a country as geographically vast and diverse as Indonesia explain to travel professionals that a problem in one area did not necessarily describe conditions thousands of kilometers away?
He needed a way to communicate quickly and directly with large numbers of travel agents.
The solution was remarkably simple by today’s standards.
Steinmetz created an online Yahoo discussion groupand began bringing travel-industry professionals together with their email addresses.
This was during an era when social media as we know it did not exist and online professional communities were still experimental.
The concept expanded.
Additional Yahoo discussion groups followed, allowing tourism professionals to communicate directly with one another. These included the ASEAN Tourism Discussion Groupand the Hawaii Tourism Network.
These early online communities became incubators for conversations, professional relationships, and tourism initiatives.
Out of this environment came eTurboNews.
Working with Singapore-based online booking company eTurboHotels, Steinmetz helped transform the concept from an industry discussion network into an online travel-industry publication.
eTurboNews: From an Email Network to Global Travel Media
What started as an innovative way to communicate with travel professionals grew into a global publishing operation.
For approximately 28 years, eTurboNewshas reported on travel and tourism around the clock, covering destinations, aviation, hospitality, tourism policy, security, crisis management, human rights and the personalities and institutions shaping the industry.
Its defining characteristics have been speed, global reach and editorial independence.
Long before digital-first publishing became the dominant media model, eTurboNews distributed tourism news electronically across international borders and built a direct global network of travel-industry professionals.
The publication also became particularly effective at providing international exposure to destinations, organizations, and tourism professionals that did not always have the resources or access to reach mainstream global media.
Over the years, eTurboNews expanded its reach to a claimed daily readership exceeding two million, including more than 200,000 travel-industry professionals, with content reaching readers in dozens of languages.
Through eTurboNews, Steinmetz became a familiar presence within the international tourism community—not simply as a publisher, but as someone continuously connected to the industry’s conversations.
His extensive LinkedIn network and professional groups became a modern extension of relationships that had been developing long before social media emerged.
CNN TASK Group: Giving Emerging Destinations a Global Voice
An important example of the position eTurboNews had developed within the international tourism community was its participation in the creation of the CNN TASK Group.
The initiative brought together CNN, eTurboNews, the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO, today UN Tourism), and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
The CNN TASK Group was conceived to help tourism destinations—particularly new and emerging destinations—gain greater international visibility and access to communications expertise and global media outreach. For Steinmetz, the initiative represented considerably more than another media collaboration.
It placed the independent publication he had helped build from an early Internet discussion network alongside internationally recognized institutions representing global media, intergovernmental tourism and international civil aviation.
It also reflected a philosophy that would recur throughout Steinmetz’s career: international tourism should not be a conversation controlled exclusively by the world’s largest destinations, corporations and institutions.
Emerging destinations, smaller tourism businesses and lesser-heard voices should also have access to the networks and communications channels capable of putting them on the international tourism map.
Tourism Security, Crisis Communication and Consulting
Publishing opened another chapter in Steinmetz’s career.
Through eTurboNews and its international relationships, Steinmetz became increasingly involved in tourism security, tourism-police training, crisis communications and destination consulting.
His work and collaborations have involved governments, tourism authorities, hospitality organizations and private-sector companies.
Projects have included work involving the Government of Jamaica, Sandals Resortsand a growing range of destinations and tourism stakeholders.
Additional partnerships and consulting relationships have included work connected with the Saudi Ministry of Tourismand, more recently, the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC).
These activities positioned Steinmetz at an unusual intersection: tourism media, government relations, destination marketing, security, crisis management and the private travel industry.
Relationships Across Global Tourism Leadership
Perhaps one of the most distinctive aspects of Steinmetz’s career is the network of professional relationships he has developed across generations of international tourism leadership.
These relationships have gone considerably beyond meeting industry personalities at conferences. In numerous cases, Steinmetz has worked directly with ministers, tourism-board leaders, international organization executives and private-sector tourism leaders on destination promotion, international campaigns, advocacy, crisis communications and industry initiatives.
Alain St. Ange and Seychelles
Among Steinmetz’s longstanding professional relationships has been his work with Alain St. Ange, former Minister of Tourism of Seychelles.
St. Ange has credited the international exposure generated by eTurboNews with helping Seychelles establish its visibility within the global tourism industry, at one point telling Steinmetz, in substance, that without eTurboNews, Seychelles would not be on the map.
The relationship became representative of the role eTurboNews frequently played for smaller destinations: providing international tourism exposure without requiring the communications budgets available to the world’s largest destinations.
Edmund Bartlett and Jamaica
Steinmetz has worked closely for many years with the Hon. Edmund Bartlett, Jamaica’s Minister of Tourism, a professional relationship that continues today.
Their cooperation has involved tourism communications and international tourism initiatives and forms part of Steinmetz’s broader involvement with Jamaica’s tourism industry.
His work connected with Jamaica has extended beyond government and has included relationships with major private-sector tourism organizations, including Sandals Resorts.
Walter Mzembi and the UNWTO Secretary-General Campaign
Steinmetz became directly involved in international tourism diplomacy when he helped run the campaign of Dr. Walter Mzembi, Zimbabwe’s former Minister of Tourism and Hospitality Industry, in his bid to become Secretary-General of UNWTO.
Mzembi ultimately finished second in the 2017 selection process.
The campaign gave Steinmetz a close view of the diplomacy, alliances and institutional politics surrounding one of international tourism’s most influential positions.
It also demonstrated another dimension of his career: using media, communications and an extensive global tourism network in support of an international tourism leadership campaign.
Gloria Guevara
Another longstanding professional relationship is with Gloria Guevara, a former Secretary of Tourism of Mexico who later served as a senior tourism adviser in Saudi Arabia and returned to lead the World Travel & Tourism Council as President and CEO.
Steinmetz assisted Guevara during her campaign for the UN Tourism Secretary-General position and worked with her during her period as a senior adviser to Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Tourism.
Their professional relationship has continued with Guevara’s return to WTTC, adding another chapter to Steinmetz’s long involvement with senior figures operating across both the governmental and private-sector sides of international tourism.
Taleb Rifai
Steinmetz has also worked closely with Dr. Taleb Rifai, former Secretary-General of UNWTO.
Their cooperation included work surrounding the development and launch of the African Tourism Board, as well as involvement connected with UNWTO efforts against the sexual exploitation of children through tourism.
That work reflected a side of Steinmetz’s career extending beyond tourism promotion and commercial travel.
Human rights, child protection, safety, and the responsibilities associated with international tourism increasingly became subjects addressed through his tourism-media and industry activities.
Hawaii Pacific Export Council and Brand USA
Steinmetz’s involvement in international tourism development also extended into U.S. trade promotion and efforts to strengthen America’s position in international markets.
He served as a member of the Hawaii Pacific Export Council (HPEC), covering Hawaii, Guam and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands.
The council works in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Commerce and the U.S. Commercial Service to assist businesses in developing international markets.
For Steinmetz, the role complemented decades of experience in international tourism, aviation, destination marketing and overseas market development.
He helped Hawaii develop and strengthen international tourism markets, including liaison activities with U.S. consulates and American representatives overseas. These relationships helped connect Hawaii’s visitor industry with travel-trade contacts and opportunities in international source markets.
Brand USA Steering Committee
Steinmetz also served on the initial steering committee for Brand USAduring the formative period of what would become the United States’ national destination-marketing organization.
His participation reflected another dimension of a career already spanning inbound tourism, aviation, destination representation, international media, overseas market development and government relations.
By this point, Steinmetz had worked on virtually both sides of international destination development: bringing visitors from emerging markets to the United States, representing foreign destinations in North America, and helping U.S. destinations and businesses develop relationships overseas. In many ways, it summarized a recurring theme throughout his career:
Bringing the world to destinations—and bringing destinations to the world.
COVID-19 and Rebuilding Travel
Then came the COVID-19 pandemic. Few events in modern history disrupted travel and tourism as completely.
Airlines were grounded. Hotels closed. Borders disappeared behind travel restrictions. Tour guides, travel agencies, destination companies, restaurants, transportation providers and small tourism businesses suddenly faced an existential crisis.
Steinmetz responded by creating Rebuilding Travel, an international online discussion initiative designed to keep the tourism community talking while much of the physical travel industry had stopped.
The discussions deliberately crossed traditional industry hierarchies.
Government ministers could participate alongside tourism-board executives, hotel leaders, academics, journalists, travel agents, entrepreneurs and tour guides.
That diversity was central to the idea.
Rebuilding tourism could not be a conversation reserved only for the largest corporations or international institutions. Professionals throughout the tourism ecosystem needed a voice.
Participants joined from around the world, and the discussions quickly demonstrated that the network could become something more permanent.
World Tourism Network
Out of Rebuilding Travelemerged the World Tourism Network (WTN).
The organization developed around the idea of connecting tourism’s public and private sectors while giving particular visibility to small and medium-sized businesses and professionals who constitute much of the global tourism economy but are not always represented proportionately in international decision-making.
Today, according to the organization’s figures, the World Tourism Network connects approximately 36,000 members and stakeholders in 133 countries.
For Steinmetz, its creation represented a continuation of something he had been doing since the earliest Yahoo discussion groups: connecting people who might otherwise never find themselves in the same room.
The technology had changed dramatically. The basic idea had not.
African Tourism Board
Steinmetz also played a role in the development and launch of the African Tourism Board.
The initiative grew from discussions and relationships within his international tourism network and reflected the importance of giving African destinations and tourism stakeholders a stronger platform for cooperation, visibility and international engagement.
Steinmetz worked with tourism leaders including former UNWTO Secretary-General Dr. Taleb Rifaiand former Seychelles Tourism Minister Alain St. Angein connection with the initiative.
Its emergence was another example of a recurring pattern throughout Steinmetz’s career:
Conversations became networks. Networks became initiatives. And initiatives sometimes developed into international organizations with lives of their own.
Travel Marketing Network: A New Chapter in Berlin
On January 1, 2026, Steinmetz opened another chapter in his international tourism career with the launch of Travel Marketing Network, a tourism consulting, marketing and representation company based in Berlin, Germany.
The venture draws on five decades of experience and relationships accumulated across virtually every sector of the international visitor industry.
Travel Marketing Network provides a platform through which Steinmetz can bring together many of the disciplines that have defined his career: destination representation, tourism marketing, media and communications, international market development, government and private-sector relations, crisis communications, strategic consulting and access to a worldwide network of tourism professionals and decision-makers.
Berlin also represents something of a return to Steinmetz’s professional roots.
His career began in Germany with group travel, Hapag-Lloyd and airline consolidation before taking him to the United States, Hawaii, Asia, the Middle East, Africa and an increasingly global role in tourism media and international industry organizations.
Five decades later, Travel Marketing Network connects those experiences with a new European base.
The company is intended to work with destinations, tourism boards, hotels and resorts, travel companies, associations and other public- and private-sector tourism stakeholders seeking representation, strategic advice, international exposure and access to established global tourism markets.
Rather than representing a departure from Steinmetz’s previous work, Travel Marketing Network brings many strands of that work together under one umbrella.
It combines the practical experience of a former tour operator and travel entrepreneur, the international relationships of a destination representative and industry networker, and the communications experience accumulated through decades of publishing eTurboNews.
The January 2026 launch therefore marks both a new venture and a continuation of a professional philosophy that has followed Steinmetz throughout his career:
Connecting destinations, businesses, and people with the markets, media, and relationships they need to be seen, understood, and successful in the international tourism industry.
Five Decades of Connections
Travel and tourism is an unusually relationship-driven industry. Ministers leave office, executives change companies, organizations evolve and new generations of tourism leaders emerge.
Through those changes, Juergen Steinmetz has remained part of the international tourism conversation for five decades.
His network was not built around one position, organization or country. It developed through years of operating travel businesses, representing destinations, publishing eTurboNews, working with governments and tourism organizations, developing international markets and connecting people across the public and private sectors.
His extensive LinkedIn network is today a visible expression of relationships that began long before social media existed. Ministers, tourism-board executives, international organization leaders, airline and hospitality executives, travel agents, tour operators, journalists, consultants and entrepreneurs have all been part of that world.
Yet the network’s significance has never been its size. It has been Steinmetz’s ability to connect people who might otherwise never have connected—a destination with a new market, a minister with an industry leader, an emerging tourism business with international exposure, or an idea with the people capable of turning it into an initiative.
That makes it difficult to describe his career with a single title. He has been a tour organizer, travel agent, airline consolidator, inbound operator, accommodation operator, destination representative, publisher, consultant, association founder and international networker.
Perhaps the simplest description is connector.
His story also has a fitting symmetry.
In 1976, a teenage Steinmetz organized members of his swimming club to travel to Montreal during the Olympic Games. Fifty years later, on January 1, 2026, he launched Travel Marketing Network in Berlin, bringing together the experience, contacts and international perspective accumulated over a lifetime in tourism.
Between Montreal and Berlin lies a career that has followed—and participated in—the transformation of modern global tourism, from printed airline tickets and traditional travel agencies to digital media, global professional networks and an industry connected instantly across continents.
The technology changed. The companies changed. The people in leadership changed. The principle did not:
Tourism is about people, relationships and connections.
After five decades, Juergen T. Steinmetz continues to publish, consult, connect, and participate in the industry that first captured his imagination as a teenager—still bringing destinations, businesses, ideas, and people together across the world.
International Tourism Experience & Relationships
Over five decades in global tourism, Steinmetz has worked with or alongside leaders and organizations including UNWTO/UN Tourism , WTTC , ICAO, CNN , Brand USA , the Hawaii Pacific Export Counci l, Jamaica’s Ministry of Tourism, Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Tourism , Indonesia’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism , World Tourism Network and African Tourism Board .
His professional relationships have included tourism leaders such as Gloria Guevara , Edmund Bartlett , Taleb Rifai , Alain St. Ange and Walter Mzembi, among many other ministers, tourism board executives and private-sector leaders worldwide.
