Cruise has “gone nuts”: Trends & strategies shared at Travel Leaders' PEAK event in T.O.

You're gonna need a bigger boat, err, make that a bigger venue.

Marking the final stop of its fall regional PEAK events, Travel Leaders Network held its “biggest show ever” on Thursday (Oct. 17) in Toronto, welcoming 260 members and more than 90 suppliers.

The networking, panel and trade show-filled “mini conference,” this year, had to be moved to a more spacious venue, the Pearson Convention Centre, replacing the Hilton Mississauga, to accommodate a growing guest list of travel advisors. 

What’s driving the big attendance numbers? Speaking with trade media yesterday, Christine James, vice-president for Canada, noted that the consortium has, in recent years, added 31 new members – host agencies that have a large base of independent contractors.

The Travel Agent Next Door (TTAND) joining Travel Leaders in 2021 certainly injected a boost. TTAND, the last time we checked, now has some 1,400 agents in its network (and counting).

Agents from Nexion Canada, Centre Holidays, and Travel Best Bets in the West (where Travel Leaders held successful PEAK events in Vancouver and Calgary earlier this month) are also filling venues.   

But there are newcomers, too, such as Ontario-based ONVIGO, Voyzant’s newly-launched host agency, one of Travel Leaders’ newest members.   

“The [ONVIGO] agents are really engaged. A lot of them are here today,” James said.

So yeah, from a recruitment perspective, things seem to be going well. By the end of 2024, Travel Leaders Canada hopes to be at some 625 members strong.

“When I look at our member numbers, we've been very fortunate to recruit some of the big ones from our competitors,” James said. “A lot of really good agencies.” 

The secret sauce 

But competition remains stiff. Referencing a virtual council meeting that Travel Leaders recently had with its Canadian members, James said that agencies, “especially the good ones,” are being targeted by competing consortiums. 

“It’s just the way the business is,” she said. 

But members are remaining loyal, it appears. “Our secret sauce is not just one, two or three things,” James said. “We have like 20 to 30 things. Depending on the member, there’s going to be something in our toolkit that’s going to be better than what anybody else can offer.” 

Size matters 

Size matters, James suggested, referencing Travel Leaders’ parent company, Internova, which provides a significant amount of “depth and breadth” when it comes to technology, support and resources. 

Travel Leaders’ cruise booking engine, for one, has “taken off on steroids,” James said. 

“We're negotiating directly with suppliers to get the direct API, or working through Sabre, and getting booking engines in place that are unique that no one else has,” she explained.

It’s all part of a new suite of tools that are debuting in Canada, including a hotel, car (and soon, air) booking engine, called SNAP.

Adding ease to the process of booking air, a pain point for many agents (especially new ones), is a priority. SNAP, which stands for “Simple Navigation Advisor Platform,” will add a newly-developed air tool in Q1 of 2025, James said.

“We have amazing airline contracts that we’ve piggy-backed off of in the U.S. It’s going to give members negotiated and commissionable rates that they can’t get anywhere else,” she said.

The idea is to make the booking process easier for agents, who won’t receive debit memos when using SNAP, James explained.

Members also have the ability to package in hotels – and there should be plenty of selection. The SNAP database will soon reach one million properties.

Lead generation tool

The other “big win” at Travel Leaders are the sales that have been reported through Agent Profiler, Travel Leaders’ lead generation tool, James said.

This is an online directory that lets agents build a profile, highlight their expertise, promote itineraries and share customer reviews – for free.

Like a dating site, the platform matches travel-curious consumers with travel advisors, resulting in new (and often profitable) business relationships.

In Canada, Travel Leaders has delivered some 9,990 leads to members who use the platform, James said.  

“Because we have such a broad database of qualified agents, we bubble up to the first spot on Google Analytics,” she said.

Not all agents use it, though, which could be a lost opportunity. The numbers paint a profitable picture. James said the average sale produced by Agent Profiler, pre-COVID, was $6,000 per booking. Now, it’s $10,000, which is “substantial.”

Why, then, aren’t more agents using the platform? James summed it up as time issue – even if Travel Leaders is trying to make it as easy as possible to publish a profile.  

Travel Leaders has staff writers who help fill in the blanks. There’s also an artificial intelligence tool, Toby AI, which can generate natural-sounding descriptions.

This seems to be helping with enrollment. James said Agent Profiler has a 20 per cent jump in published pages.

The advisors who are using it are “reaping the benefits,” she said, sharing an example of an agent who published a profile, and then ten days later, scored a booking to Costa Rica for 90 people.

Quality over quantity

As for how business is going, the “revenge travel” days, which exceeded all sales targets, are levelling off, James said.

This year, James isn’t seeing the percentage growth that she saw in 2019 (the company’s best year on record), but is seeing growth over 2023, “which is amazing,” she said.

The average sale is up 40 per cent, she said, suggesting that sales are being driven by quality instead of quantity.

Cruise has “gone nuts,” she said. In fact, it now represents 38 per cent of Travel Leaders’ overall business.

River cruising, in particular, is having a moment. The demand is so strong, “they can’t build enough ships and can’t find enough rivers to sail,” James said.

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