A toast to 25 years: RIT Vacations celebrates a quarter century of Irish spirit in Canada

It was a sun-kissed October afternoon in Toronto’s Danforth neighbourhood, and the cheers and laughter spilling out from Noonan’s Irish pub was the sound of success — 25 years of it, to be exact.

Inside, the crowd – journalists, travel pros, Irish suppliers, and RIT staff, including bold-faced names like Director of Sales Jonathan Sargeant and Sales Manager John Fallon – was buzzing as RIT Vacations celebrated a milestone anniversary.

The event featured live Celtic-folk music by The O’Deadlys, performances by green and black-clad dancers from the Graham School of Irish Dance, and freshly-smoked oysters shucked by Patrick McMurray — “ShuckerPaddy,” a world champion oyster shucker.

Guests sipped frothy Guinness, smooth Jameson and real Irish coffee prepared by Kevin Adams of Dublin’s Walking Food Tours, while attendees, including 12 visiting suppliers from Ireland — in Ontario for a roadshow — mingled and toasted the occasion.

The man of the hour, Ian Duffy, stood with pride. Twenty-five years ago, few would have guessed that the travel company he founded with his wife Patricia in September 2001 — then primarily known as Royal Irish Tours — would grow into one of Canada’s most-trusted tour operators specializing in Ireland, Scotland, England, and Wales.

But Duffy’s timing, in those early days, could hardly have been worse.

A brave start in a dark time

“We started the company in September 2001,” Duffy said, speaking to PAX at yesterday’s gathering. “Shockingly, a week or two later, September 11th happened. It was a scary time. We were very unsure as to what the future held. People thought we were crazy, opening a new business.”

Airlines were collapsing — Canada 3000, for one— and airports were nearly empty. Yet, despite the fear and uncertainty gripping the world, Duffy pushed forward.

He had spent decades honing his expertise in European travel. At the time, he was heading up the European division at Sunquest Vacations. But something inside told him it was time to go his own way.

“I felt that various companies at the time were cookie-cutter in their style,” he said. “As an Irish family, we felt we could do a lot better. At the time, many tour companies were not just selling Ireland, but they were also selling Egypt, Morocco, France, Spain and Italy. We saw an opening for a niche company that just specialized in Ireland.”

Armed with that conviction, the Duffys printed their first brochure — the only travel brochure in Canada, at the time, dedicated solely to Ireland.

“All the other brochures were a mix of Ireland and many other countries,” Duffy recalled. “We introduced this one brochure solely promoting Ireland. We wanted to do something a little different from the other guys.”

A Canadian company with Irish heart

From the start, RIT Vacations (or Royal Irish Tours) wasn’t targeting the Irish diaspora — at least, not exclusively.

“Our market wasn’t Irish people. It was Canadian people,” Duffy explained. “The good thing about Canada is that Ireland is definitely on a bucket list for a majority of Canadians.”

That very first brochure, released in 2002, featured 15 coach tours. Today, RIT offers more than 250 scheduled departures annually, with a suite of travel styles: coach tours (with a maximum of 38 guests), small-group premium sightseeing (up to 18 guests, featuring off-road experiences), flexible self-drive holidays, rail tours, city stays, and “chauffeur drives”—a premium option that blends the freedom of a road trip with the ease of a private driver, who doubles as a local guide.

(PAX actually experienced RIT’s chauffeur drive in May – click here to read more about that experience!)

“It’s grown hugely over the years,” Duffy said, reflecting on RIT's portfolio (which, to date, has served more than 200,000 Canadian travellers). “Ireland is still the biggest part of it all, but we also offer Scotland, England, and Wales.”

From Dublin to Richmond Hill — and back again

Duffy’s connection to travel stretches back half a century. Fresh out of school in 1975, he worked for JWT (a big travel company at the time), later joining Chieftain Tours in Dublin, selling flights to Canada.

It was there that he met Patricia, a young Canadian working in Ireland to help Chieftain sell its Canadian tours. The two married in 1984.

By the late 1980s, Ireland’s economy was struggling. “It was very tough,” Duffy recalled. “Jobs were hard to come by, there was a lot of unemployment, tax rates were extremely high. Everything pointed to us moving to Canada, so we made the jump.”

The couple moved to Richmond Hill, ON, in 1988 with their one-year-old son, Conor. Duffy took a job with Sunquest, overseeing the company’s newly-formed European department and charter flights between Toronto and Dublin.

Over the years, as their family grew — and as their Canadian roots deepened — Ian and Patricia began dreaming about launching something of their own.

By the early 2000s, that dream became Royal Irish Tours, built on a simple idea: authentic, Irish-led experiences, tailored for Canadians.

Expanding the Celtic circle

By 2006, as interest in RIT’s tours surged, clients began asking a familiar question: “Do you do Scotland?”

“We had a lot of people who absolutely loved and adored the tours we were doing in Ireland,” Duffy said. “But they kept asking us about Scotland, England, and Wales.”

Duffy saw an opportunity — and a natural connection to other Celtic nations. Expanding RIT’s itineraries into the U.K. “was an organic move,” he said.

A Scotland brochure followed in 2006, with England and Wales added by 2010. Around that time, the company rebranded as RIT Vacations — short for Royal Irish Tours — to reflect its broader Celtic offerings while staying true to its niche roots.

A true family affair

What makes RIT truly unique, Duffy said, is that it remains a family business in every sense of the word.

“We’re very proud to be a Canadian-owned company and a family-run company,” he said. “As a family, we have certain values that transfer into the business. We’ve always brought our kids up to be the best they can be – and that shows in our business.”

All four of the Duffys’ children now play key roles in RIT’s operations. Conor, who was born in Dublin, serves as vice president; Sinead manages the reservations; and Lorcan, the “financial whiz,” oversees the financial side.

Meanwhile, Ronan made the reverse journey of his parents — moving from Canada to Ireland.

In 2016, RIT opened an office in Dublin as the company expanded its reach. Ronan emigrated there and now runs the office as director.

Opening that Dublin office marked major turning point for RIT, which previously relied on local DMCs to run its tours.

“It’s been a major success for us,” Duffy said of his Dublin-based office. “All our clients are handled by our own staff and family in Dublin, with 24/7 care. Customers leaving Canada and arriving in Ireland are met and looked after by our own company — which provides a much better service. We're involved in every piece of the journey.”

Ronan, by the way, married an Irish woman and recently welcomed a baby girl — making RIT’s transatlantic story come full circle.

Family values, Canadian pride

For Duffy, being both Canadian-owned and Irish-rooted has been central to RIT’s success.

“Our clientele like the fact that we’re a family-run company,” he said. “People are comfortable with us because they see us as an Irish-Canadian company that knows the product. People trust us.”

That trust, Duffy believes, is reinforced by RIT’s commitment to Canadian travel advisors.

“We’ve continually worked with the travel trade since we started,” he said. “They have been monumental in our success story. Without them, we’re nothing.”

He still believes in the power of human connection — especially in an era where artificial intelligence-powered chatbots can book a trip with a few clicks.

“Our customers like talking to a human,” Duffy said. “Somebody who has been to the destination, who has experienced it, and can talk about it. There’s always going to be a 60-plus market moving forward, and they’ll always appreciate that human touch.”

That philosophy extends to RIT's marketing. The company is still a firm believer in print advertising, buying up ad space in major dailies like the Toronto Star.

“People might think it's old fashioned, but we've continued advertising in print because I see the results. It works,” Duffy said. “We obviously do social media and all the other stuff. But our demographic still reads newspapers. Our marketing is a bit of the old, mixed in with the new.”  

Looking ahead: authenticity above all

Even as competitors expand into more European destinations, Duffy said RIT will stay focused on what it does best: selling Ireland, Scotland, England, and Wales.

“As a niche operator, I don’t see us going outside of our Celtic nations,” he said. “We want to keep it authentic. We’re happy to keep doing what we do — and do it better.”

The bulk of RIT's customers are from Canada, and if the company one day expands into the U.S. market (it's an ongoing conversation), it will be with same philosophy that guided RIT from the start: family, authenticity, and a deep understanding of the places they sell.

And resilience. From surviving 9/11 to navigating other challenges that came years later, such as SARS and the COVID-19 pandemic, RIT Vacations has continually adapted—emerging stronger each time, thanks to the dedication of its people.

“They say it takes a village to raise a child. Well, our company is bit like that,” Duffy told yesterday’s attendees in a speech.

That “village” includes the invaluable support of key tourism partners — notably Tourism Ireland, VisitBritain, VisitScotland, and VisitWales.

And, of course, it wouldn’t be complete without the dedication of the RIT team.

“We've had an incredible village of people help us over the years to make this all possible,” Duffy told the room. “We've had brilliant staff who have worked with us from day one...from ten years to twenty years.”

“They've been crucial to our success, and without them, we wouldn't be here today.”

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