To­ba­go’s div­ing ex­pe­ri­ence is grow­ing in pop­u­lar­i­ty, and was a ma­jor draw to en­thu­si­asts, tour op­er­a­tors and trav­el busi­ness­es par­tic­i­pat­ing in the re­cent Div­ing Equip­ment and Mar­ket­ing As­so­ci­a­tion (DE­MA) trade show in Las Ve­gas.

Ac­cord­ing to of­fi­cials at the To­ba­go Tourism Agency Lim­it­ed (TTAL), sev­er­al of the is­land's niche fa­cil­i­ties for divers and snorkelling en­thu­si­asts were show­cased at the event, which ran from No­vem­ber 19-22, 2024.

The DE­MA Show is known glob­al­ly as one of the biggest trade events for div­ing and ac­tion wa­ter sports.

“To­ba­go’s re­cent fea­tures in Na­tion­al Ge­o­graph­ic’s The Plume and Ex­pe­di­tion Ama­zon on Dis­ney Plus, Hu­lu and NGTV,” TTAL said in a re­lease, “its place­ment on Trav­el and Leisure’s 20 Best Scu­ba Div­ing Des­ti­na­tions in the World, and the high­ly-an­tic­i­pat­ed re­turn of the Man­ta Lodge and Dive Cen­tre were among the “show-stop­ping at­trac­tions” that caught the at­ten­tion of tour op­er­a­tors, trav­el busi­ness­es and divers from around the world at this year’s DE­MA Show.”

TTAL says the 2024 DE­MA Show at­tract­ed thou­sands of trav­el in­dus­try pro­fes­sion­als, and pro­vid­ed a strong plat­form to show­case To­ba­go’s dive of­fer­ings.

Among the stake­hold­ers who pro­mot­ed the To­ba­go dive prod­uct along­side TTAL were the To­ba­go Dive Ex­pe­ri­ence, Ba­co­let Beach Club and the Man­ta Lodge and Dive Cen­tre.

L to R - Camryn Bruno, Marketing Officer E-IDCOT; Ashly Brody, Professional Association of Diving Instructors (PADI) Marketing; David Benz, Director PADI Marketing; and Perl Henry, Marketing Officer, TTAL. [Image courtesy Tobago Tourism Agency Limited]

“To­ba­go's dive niche has ex­pe­ri­enced ex­cep­tion­al growth, firm­ly po­si­tion­ing our is­land as a pre­mier des­ti­na­tion for divers world­wide,” said Ja­son An­toine, TTAL Di­rec­tor of Mar­ket­ing and Com­mu­ni­ca­tions.

An­toine says To­ba­go of­fers a pre­mier un­der­wa­ter ex­pe­ri­ence that can on­ly be de­scribed as “be­yond or­di­nary”, which the Agency in­tends to cap­i­talise on next year.

“In the up­com­ing year, we are com­mit­ted to strength­en­ing re­la­tion­ships with key stake­hold­ers and forg­ing new part­ner­ships to el­e­vate To­ba­go’s dive tourism to new heights and in­crease its vis­i­bil­i­ty on the glob­al stage,” he re­ports. “With an un­par­al­leled un­der­wa­ter of­fer­ing that in­cludes vi­brant ma­rine bio­di­ver­si­ty and icon­ic dive sites like the Mav­er­ick Wreck, we aim to con­tin­ue de­liv­er­ing un­for­get­table ex­pe­ri­ences for sea­soned divers and new­com­ers alike.”

He added: “To­ba­go’s crys­tal-clear wa­ters and unique dive ad­ven­tures will re­main at the heart of our strat­e­gy as we strive to so­lid­i­fy our rep­u­ta­tion as the ul­ti­mate des­ti­na­tion for ad­ven­ture, beau­ty, and seren­i­ty be­neath the waves.”

To­ba­go boasts over 50 stun­ning and well-es­tab­lished dive sites, in­clud­ing the Lon­don Bridge Arch in Char­lot­teville, the Kelle­ston Drain off the coast of Lit­tle To­ba­go, An­gel Reef in East To­ba­go and the Mount Irvine Wall and Kari­wak Reef to the west of the is­land.