My day on the road visiting agents with Tui's ‘unicorn’

Our day starts at Billington Travel in Riverhead, where Catherine Thompson, company director, says she used to tell people to book Tui direct for 18 years. Now the operator is on her list to check for bucket-and-spade enquiries and in one instance, she even gained a new customer because she was able to book Tui holidays. “They used to go to Tui in Bluewater, and they’ve booked two holidays already with me this year.” 

“I’m happy to work with people if they show they want to work with agents,” she adds.

Trade-only discounts

It’s the first time Holly has met any of these agents and she has a tick list of points to discuss. She’s keen to promote the Tui for Trade Partners Facebook page, where agents can access exclusive trade discount codes, information about new products and season launches, and incentives. “There’s even the odd cheesy video from me,” she adds.

Holly also wants to make agents more aware of what they can book on Tui’s trade website, including tours, multi-centres and city breaks. “You don’t need to pick up the phone to us to book city and beach, or two different hotels for one holiday, or a standard room and then upgraded room in the same hotel,” she says. There is a support team manning the trade relations inbox and they can help with “escalations, amendments, and anything out of the ordinary”, she explains.

And she wants agents to know they are able to book packages with third party flights on the system: “If your customers want an easyJet flight, because it leaves at a more convenient time, or they want British Airways for the points, you can do that through us.”

After 20 years working in Tui retail and three years as base manager for Tui Airways at Gatwick, Holly cheerfully tells me that a little scepticism from long-in-the-tooth agents doesn’t faze her, and she’s excited by the challenge of winning them over.

“I want them to tell us the good, the bad and the ugly,” she says. “The ugly is the most important. We’re a new team, we will get things wrong, but tell us so we can fix it.”

The price needs to be right

Over at Baldwins Travel in Sevenoaks, when branch manager Hayley Oliver says price parity is one of the biggest barriers to selling Tui, Holly emphasises that online price differences are now at their lowest: “If you see anything that appears impossible to match, tell us, because something is wrong,” she urges the team, while highlighting the trade-only discount codes which can be passed onto customers. “Whilst we cannot give you price parity on beach holidays, we’re giving agents as many tools as possible to get round it.”

Holly also wants to distance herself from any perceived allegiance to Tui’s own high street stores: "If I walk past one, I will literally ignore it, it’s not relevant for me."

A phone call interrupts our chat with Lisa Barnes, owner-director at LJ Travel in Borough Green. “I’m just in the office with our new one and only Tui rep,” says Lisa to her business partner Jayne Otto, on the other end. “Ooh,” is Jayne’s audible response. “I like that, I’m like a mythical creature, a unicorn,” Holly laughs.

Differentiated product

The subject of pricing comes up again. Lisa tells Holly she cannot morally justify a more expensive quote for the same hotels, flights and transfer package that she can source cheaper elsewhere.

“That’s why we want you to learn more about our differentiated products, like the luxury Sensatori and understand what customers are getting for their money,” counters Holly.

“We were impressed by the Dreamliner and we’ve been selling that,” Lisa replies. Service is also an important consideration, she adds: “If something goes wrong, we need to know our clients will be looked after. If we’ve got that now with Tui, then that’s a big box ticked.” 

This is echoed by Nick Marks, managing director of Baldwins Travel’s 11 branches, who we meet in Maidstone. “We’re in uncharted waters so there is some trepidation, but Tui is on the right road now and we’re looking to a bright future. Good things will happen when something goes wrong and it gets sorted out straight away. That’s when you’ll see bookings start to fly,” he says.

Given senior travel consultant Wendy Sharp’s personal experience, during last August’s Air Traffic Control meltdown, of being stranded in Croatia having booked a Tui package with third-party flights and then paying over the odds to get home, the Maidstone team are interested to hear that Tui has opened a dynamic duty office to oversee third-party flights. “That’s good news,” says Wendy. “At least I know my customers won’t go through what I did.”

All systems go 

Our final visit is to Hays Travel in Maidstone, where the majority of their Caribbean business is now done through Tui. “We really like your long-haul,” says assistant manager Vicki Dickenson. And their interest is piqued when Holly shows them the self-drive itineraries, including hotels, on the system, highlighting Croatia as an example. “I didn’t know about that, and it sounds really good. Croatia is big for us this year,” says manager Lauren Fawcett.