Four of the five cities returning to Tulum are Canadian

The Mexican Caribbean tourism promotion for the rest of 2026 will be aimed at the United States, the market that sends the most visitors to Cancún and has fallen the furthest this year.

Bernardo Cueto Riestra, secretary of tourism for Quintana Roo, said the state will run a permanent round of road shows with travel agencies in the United States and Canada, part of a set of touring promotional caravans running to the close of the year. The audience is the sales channel, not the traveler.

From Tulum, the question is what the flight schedule looks like once the selling is done. The announcement named Cancún, Isla Mujeres, and Puerto Morelos, and grouped everything else as the rest of the Mexican Caribbean. The routes returning to Tulum's airport this winter are almost all Canadian, and the market the state says it most needs to win back has only one city on the list.

The Mexican Caribbean tourism promotion begins with travel agents

A road show is a room full of meetings rather than an advertisement. The state puts its destinations and hoteliers in front of wholesalers and agents in the cities that generate bookings, on the grounds that a destination missing from an agent's shortlist disappears from the customer's.

The meetings segment has a fixed date. Imex America, the largest trade show for the meetings and events industry in the United States, runs October 13 to 15 at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, and the state describes it as its key appointment on American soil. Alongside it runs the campaign the state calls the Vacation Capital of the World, pushed through social platforms and paid space, both digital and traditional. That campaign launched at the Fitur fair in Madrid in January and was aimed at the United States, Canada, Brazil, Colombia, and Europe.

The wider calendar has been filling since midsummer. In late July, Cueto said the state delegation was preparing a promotional tour of Houston, Austin, and Orlando; meetings with travel agencies and consortia in Mexico City; and appearances at fairs in Argentina, Brazil, and Paris during September. Sedetur has paired the general sun-and-sand events with specialized fairs for congresses, conventions, and sports tourism.

Spirit's bankruptcy alone took about 120,000 seats out of the region

The reason for the push is arithmetic.

Cueto, in remarks reported on August 27, attributed part of the year's contraction to the collapse of Spirit Airlines, which he said stopped operating around 120,000 airline seats toward the region. He listed the rest of the causes as higher jet fuel costs, a strong peso, inflation, uncertainty in strategic markets, and rising airline ticket prices.

He also said August, September, and October would be difficult months for the Mexican Caribbean, even after the state passed 10 million tourists for the year. Reporting published on August 11 put the summer reduction in available airline seats to Quintana Roo at close to 10 percent.

Cancún airport keeps sliding

Grupo Aeroportuario del Sureste, which operates the terminal, reported 2,409,437 passengers through Cancún in July, 8.4 percent below the 2,631,540 recorded in July 2025. Across the first seven months of the year, the airport ran 5.2 percent behind 2025.

The first half carries the same shape in more detail. The terminal moved 14,757,599 passengers between January and June, down 4.7 percent. International traffic accounted for 10,245,822 of them and fell 3.9 percent, while domestic traffic, at 4,511,777, fell 6.4 percent. On the second quarter results, Asur reported that passenger volumes from the United States dropped 11.7 percent, Europe 11.8 percent, South America 6.5 percent, and Mexico 1.9 percent. Canada was the one market that grew.

Cancún peaked in 2023 at 32.8 million passengers and closed 2025 with 29.3 million, marking its third consecutive year of decline. Construction on the new terminal continues, with a reopening planned for the fourth quarter.

Four of the five cities rejoining Tulum's winter map are Canadian

Tulum's airport entered the year in worse condition than Cancún's. International passenger traffic fell 34 percent in the first quarter, roughly 90,800 travelers fewer than in the same period of 2025, and domestic traffic dropped close to 25 percent. A terminal that flew to 12 international destinations in 2024 was left with four United States routes, to Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, and Miami. We reported that contraction in June, when four carriers had already suspended service.

The winter package reverses part of it. Haydee Hernández Pastrana, Tulum's director general of tourism, said eight international routes return for the 2026-2027 season, operated by United Airlines, Air Canada, Air Transat, and WestJet, with direct flights from Newark, Toronto, Montreal, Quebec, and Calgary. The federal tourism ministry put the number at nine routes, and Governor Mara Lezama described nine international destinations as part of a wider package of 13 routes flown by ten airlines. The counts differ. The cities do not.

Four of the five are in Canada.

The single United States link is United's Newark service, which Hernández Pastrana said runs from December 17 to January 24. Air Canada returns from Toronto on October 25 and from Montreal on October 29, both scheduled through late March. Air Transat resumes Montreal and Quebec from October 25. WestJet brings back four seasonal frequencies connecting Toronto, Montreal, and Calgary.

So the market Quintana Roo will spend the rest of the year chasing is the one with the thinnest presence in Tulum's returning schedule, and its only route lands in the weeks around the holidays.

Cueto moves the harder work to 2027

Next year is where the secretary put the specific commitment. He said the 2027 effort will center on the United States market, along with some European markets and the domestic one, all of which have been affected. Canada, Brazil, Colombia, and Argentina are advancing, he said, but the volume the United States moves determines occupancy, connectivity, and spending.

The share explains the priority. American travelers accounted for about 35 percent of visitors to the state, according to figures published in July, ahead of Mexico at 29 percent and Canada at 18 percent.

The strain is already visible in the hotel calendar. Cueto acknowledged that some hotels in the Riviera Maya and Puerto Morelos have weighed operating seasonally rather than year-round, while insisting that the destinations stay open every day of the year.

The calendar sets the tests. Imex America opens October 13 in Las Vegas. The first returning seasonal flight lands in Tulum on October 25, coming from Toronto. Newark, the only United States city on the winter list, waits until December 17.

Would more direct flights from the United States change how you plan a winter in Tulum, or is Cancún still the easier way in? Join the conversation and share your perspective with us on Instagram and Facebook at @thetulumtimes.