P.R. Tourism Co. relaunches ¡Qué Pasa!
...now combined with CCI's Puerto Rico Travel & Tourism magazine

Surrounded by a group of about 100 guests that included several key people of the Tourism industry as well as members of the government and media, Terestella González Denton, the executive director of the Puerto Rico Tourism Company, announced the new stage of the ¡Qué Pasa! Magazine, beginning in September, 2007. It will again be edited, published and distributed by Casiano Communications. “This is a dramatic transformation for our publication that has been with the PRTC since 1948. It will contain several sections that will not only interest the tourist but our local people as well because they will have an excellent product that will inform them of all the activities and facilities available right here in Puerto Rico, so they will know where to go during their leisure time. Besides that, it is a very good business deal because the new contract with Casiano Communications, for editing, publishing and distributing ¡Qué Pasa! represents a saving of half a million dollars annually for our agency,” explained González Denton.

Manuel Casiano, chairman of the board of Casiano Communications, the largest U.S. Hispanic magazine publishing group in the U.S.A. expressed the pleasure he feels at regaining ¡Qué Pasa! as part of his publishing organization. “We were the publishers of ¡Qué Pasa! for a decade (the last two years of the Hernández Colón administration and both terms of the Rosselló administration.) When Governor Sila Calderón came into office and gave the publication to another company we started a new monthly tourism magazine, Puerto Rico Travel & Tourism, which has done very well on its own. We have about 15,000 paid subscriptions and about 10,000 magazines are being sold on local newsstands, plus the ones that are distributed to hotels and all levels of the tourism industry. This proves that not only tourists were interested in our leisure activities throughout the Island, but locals as well. ¡Qué Pasa! did well and our magazine also did well... so combining both in a single publication will result in a spectacular magazine,” said Casiano.

The Publisher of CARIBBEAN BUSINESS and another 10 publications points out that now advertisers won’t have to choose between the two publications, because with one ad they will be reaching both the tourists and our locals. The local people, according to Casiano, are the ones that maintain the tourism industry afloat when the tourism season ends. “And now with ¡Qué Pasa!,” besides the 95,000 magazines that are distributed to the industry, our subscribers and the sales through our newsstands, we will be sending magazines to travel agencies all over the world so when someone walks into an agency looking for ideas of where to go on vacation he or she will have a beautiful publication to show all Puerto Rico has to offer,” emphasized Casiano.

“We feel very enthusiastic with the new ¡Qué Pasa!” indicated González Denton, “because it will also serve as an educational tool for educating our local people on the many attractions we have, sometimes minutes away from where they are. Also, I feel very proud of the new format that editor Ronald C. Flores has designed and produced: very simple but also very modern and easy to read, with direct and concise information, according to the needs of our visitors.” The PRTC director also pointed out that the new ¡Qué Pasa! consists of four sections: (destinations, feature stories, lists and maps) for a more agile and easier reading process. For example, all the information regarding transportation will be in the same section and also will have a pull-out map that will show the main avenues as well as the main streets throughout the Island and more specifically in the areas of San Juan, Condado and Isla Verde. The new ¡Qué Pasa! will be published six times a year, every two months, to keep all the information fresh and updated.