Rendez-vous en France · 2027

Agoris analysis · updated October 2026

Key takeaways

• Rendez-vous en France is the B2B trade show for the international marketing of France's tourism offering: two days of pre-scheduled business meetings between French tourism providers and the tour operators, agencies and influencers from around the world.
• Organiser: Atout France, France's tourism development agency, which has run the show since its creation and rotates it every year to a different host destination.
• Next edition: the 20th, on Tuesday 23 and Wednesday 24 March 2027 in Bordeaux, Nouvelle-Aquitaine. The bid was put forward jointly by the Bordeaux Métropole Tourist and Convention Office and the Nouvelle-Aquitaine Regional Tourism Committee.
• The precise host venue in Bordeaux had not been announced at the time of writing. Atout France states that the edition's official website will open in late October 2026, stand sales will open in early November 2026 and close in mid-December 2026.
• Results of the last edition (2026, 19th, in Nice): 704 exhibiting companies, 814 international buyers and influencers from 52 countries, 28,465 business meetings and 430 international tour operators hosted on educational tours.
• A 100% trade event, invitation-only on the buyer side: international influencers are selected and invited by Atout France's overseas offices, they cannot register freely.

Who exhibits

Typical profile

Rendez-vous en France is not a product trade show or a public-facing event: it is a sales workshop. The exhibitors are French tourism providers who come to get their offering listed in the brochures and platforms of foreign distributors. Atout France opens the exhibition to accommodation operators, restaurateurs, tourist offices and promotion bodies, visitor sites and attractions, inbound tour operators (agences réceptives), transport companies, coach operators and transfer companies, as well as service and activity providers.

The participation pricing distinguishes two profiles: operators active in a single region, whose rates are partially or fully subsidised by their regional body (comité régional du tourisme, region, attractiveness agency, Paris je t'aime), and multi-regional or national operators, hotel groups, French inbound operators and vehicle rental companies, who fall under larger stand formats. The show is open to both Atout France members and non-members.

Notable exhibitors

Atout France does not publish an exhibitor list in advance: the directory is reserved for registered participants, and matchmaking runs through the pre-scheduled meeting planner. Participation terms, stand formats and registration procedures are detailed on the show's professional website, which serves as the single entry point for exhibitors and buyers alike.

Quality of the audience

This is the show's defining feature. Buyers do not attend of their own accord: they are identified and invited by Atout France's international network, which produces an entirely qualified audience. The organiser reports close to 800 influencers each year, split for the 2026 edition between 51% from Europe, 25% from Asia, Africa and Oceania, 20% from the Americas and 4% from the Middle East.

Contact volume is the real indicator: more than 28,000 pre-scheduled meetings over two days, an average of around thirty planned meetings and four spontaneous meetings per exhibitor, according to the satisfaction surveys carried out by Atout France in 2025. The same survey states that 95% of tour operators attending say the show influences their choice of destinations and experiences, and that 66% of the companies met in 2025 were new contacts for exhibitors, compared with 60% in 2024 and 71% in 2023.

Events & community

Format and programme

The format is tight and does not vary: two days of pre-scheduled 20-minute meetings, with a personalised schedule for each staff member attending. Exhibitors can request meetings in advance with the tour operators that matter most for their markets, which shifts most of the sales work ahead of the show, to when the meeting book opens.

Around the meetings, the programme rests on two lunches and the Soirée France, an informal highlight that showcases the host destination. There is no conference programme: the show is built around matchmaking, not content.

Educational tours (éductours)

The éductours (educational tours) are the show's direct extension and often its best return on investment for a destination. International buyers head out to see the offering on the ground on the weekend before or after the show, all across France. The 2026 edition hosted 430 international tour operators on éductours. At the 2025 edition in Lyon, around thirty éductours were organised across Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, including eleven programmes stopping in Lyon, in addition to the 26 trade press journalists from 17 countries hosted for a one-day discovery visit.

For the 2027 edition, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, France's largest region, offers plenty of ground to cover: the Bordeaux vineyards, the Atlantic coastline, the Pyrenees.

Community and networks

Rendez-vous en France occupies a distinct place in the French trade calendar: it is the spring gathering, focused on selling the France destination internationally. It does not replace IFTM Top Resa, the Paris autumn trade show where French distribution buys from around the world, nor Destination Montagnes, the Grenoble workshop centred on mountain tourism. The three events complement rather than compete with one another: Rendez-vous en France gets French offerings into foreign programming, IFTM Top Resa structures the domestic market, Destination Montagnes covers a single sector.

The host city is chosen through a consultation between candidate destinations, decided by Atout France, with the announcement made at a press conference during the current show: Bordeaux was thus named on 31 March 2026, from Nice, by Adam Oubuih, Managing Director of Atout France.

On site: what you need to know

At the time of writing, neither Atout France nor local partners had announced the precise host venue in Bordeaux. Atout France's specifications require exhibition infrastructure able to accommodate around 700 stands and 800 buyers on a single site, together with well-developed rail and air access and a varied hotel stock: three criteria the Bordeaux bid was recognised as meeting. The venue will be confirmed on the edition's official website, whose opening is announced for late October 2026.

On access to the destination, Bordeaux is around two hours from Paris by TGV since the opening of the LGV Sud Europe Atlantique high-speed line, and Bordeaux-Mérignac airport is linked to the city centre by tram. In late March, the city is not in peak season, but the combination of the show and the éductours takes up a significant share of the hotel stock: booking early remains the rule.

How much it costs to exhibit

Preparing your visit

For the exhibitor

• Watch for the edition's official website to open, announced for late October 2026, then for stand sales to open in early November 2026. Closing is planned for mid-December 2026: on previous editions, the registration deadline fell in mid-December, with no extension.
• Check eligibility for a subsidised rate with the regional tourism committee or attractiveness agency. The gap between the full rate and the subsidised rate exceeds €1,000 excl. VAT on a standard stand.
• Decide between the five participation formats based on the number of staff attending: the number of meetings that can be absorbed over two days depends directly on the number of badges and tables.
• Prepare the meeting book in advance: this is where the show's return on investment is decided. Approach key tour operators for your target markets by name rather than waiting for automatic allocation.
• Consider linking up with a regional éductour: for a destination or site, bringing buyers on site over the weekend surrounding the show turns a 20-minute meeting into a full pitch.

For the decision-making visitor

• Buyer access cannot be requested freely: international influencers are invited by Atout France's overseas offices. The point of contact is the Atout France office in your country.
• Visitor registration for the 2027 edition is announced for early to mid-January 2027, after stand sales close.
• Plan for the full week if taking part in an éductour: the programmes run on the weekend before or after the show.
• Prepare your shortlist of exhibitors in advance: with around thirty 20-minute meetings over two days, the schedule fills up before arrival in Bordeaux.

Policy and CSR initiatives

The choice of Bordeaux for 2027 is explicitly driven by the sustainability angle. Atout France states that the city and Nouvelle-Aquitaine met all the criteria in the specifications, rail and air access, hotel stock and hosting infrastructure, but that it was the region's commitment to a sustainable and inclusive tourism strategy that tipped the decision. The Bordeaux Métropole Tourist and Convention Office and the Nouvelle-Aquitaine Regional Tourism Committee have been engaged for several years in transforming their tourism model, with a stated ambition of more responsible, balanced and inclusive tourism. Bordeaux ranked 6th worldwide in the 2024 Global Destination Sustainability Index.

On the organiser's side, this fits into Atout France's roadmap under the national Destination France plan, which aims to make France a benchmark destination for sustainable tourism by 2030. Atout France runs the France Tourisme Durable platform for this purpose, allowing professionals to assess themselves and start transforming their offering, and signed a partnership agreement with ADEME on the same objective in 2022.

On the show itself, the editorial in the 2026 brochure, signed by the Managing Director of Atout France, calls on exhibitors to showcase offerings that are more responsible, more inclusive and accessible to all. The eco-responsible measures for the 2027 edition in Bordeaux are not yet publicly documented: they will partly depend on the host venue, which has not been announced at this stage.

How the trade show has evolved

Trajectory analysis

The show has reached maturity in terms of volume. Between 2025 and 2026, the number of exhibitors and buyers stayed almost stable, at around 700 French companies and 815 influencers, with a little over 28,000 business meetings in both years. This is not a show chasing attendance growth: its capacity is structurally capped by the format, two days, a single site, a 20-minute meeting schedule.

The real movement lies elsewhere. The geographic diversity of buyers narrowed between the two editions, from 62 countries represented in 2025 to 52 in 2026, at a comparable buyer volume: Atout France's international network tightened its selection to a smaller number of markets, with Europe accounting for half the invitations. For an exhibitor, this means a slightly more concentrated audience, so target markets are worth checking before committing.

The other variable is the show's travelling format. Toulouse in 2024, Lyon in 2025, Nice in 2026, Bordeaux in 2027: the annual rotation promotes the host destinations, but it means everything has to be rechecked at each edition, from the host venue to logistics. For 2027, this point remains open: the city is confirmed, the venue is not yet.

All data that does not mention a source comes from the organiser's website.

Unless otherwise stated, all factual data in this listing comes from the organiser's official website (atout-france.fr).