In case you stroll down Rue Charlot in Paris at lunchtime, you’ll probably encounter a line stretching alongside the slim sidewalks. Spanish, American or Korean vacationers wait, generally for an hour, for his or her final reward: a sandwich. Or relatively “the perfect sandwich in Paris,” because it has been dubbed by guests in photographs or movies amassing thousands and thousands of views on TikTok or Instagram. On social media, Chez Alain Miam Miam is a phenomenon that has far surpassed the proprietor, Alain Roussel, a 70-year-old former psychotherapist. He acknowledged upfront: He had “no technique” for communication. “I by no means spent a single cent on it.” He used social media little or no and has no group supervisor: Vacationers did all of the work for him. He opened in 2005, on the fringe of the picturesque lined market of Les Enfants Rouges. Nevertheless it was after the Covid-19 pandemic that his stall noticed an explosion, with photographs of his sandwiches, oozing with melted cheese, multiplying on social media. Today, he sells between 400 and 500 a day, at €13 every.
And it isn’t at all times a nice expertise. Overwhelmed with prospects, he made recruitment errors, confronted a number of issues with suppliers and pissed off many vacationers when he closed store. His enterprise went by means of two turbulent years. Relations with the neighborhood, on this quiet Marais district, are “sophisticated,” he admitted. Retailers are irritated by the congestion in entrance of their home windows. Amongst Chez Alain Miam Miam’s staff, one is answerable for managing the queue solely.
Extraordinary rebound
That is tourism in 2025, with its on the spot fame amplified by buzz, its cult of the great deal, its checklists and its shared photographs. In brief, tourism within the age of social media, for higher or for worse. Within the span of 4 years, travel-related content material has exploded on these platforms: Up 410% since 2021 on TikTok, in response to Anaïs Devaux, head of this sector at TikTok France. On Instagram, almost two million travel-related posts have been made in 2024, in response to calculations by the company We Are Social. These social networks have turn into the brand new vacationer guides and have definitely been one of many drivers of the extraordinary rebound the journey sector has skilled since 2022.
You may have 80.27% of this text left to learn. The remainder is for subscribers solely.
