Spelling out service key for sustained future of luxury advisors
Luxury agents are increasingly ‘putting their foot down’ when it comes to potentially time-wasting clients, a group of advisors in south-west England have shared at the latest exclusive Grecotel Hotels & Resorts lunch with TTG Luxury.
With such a healthy post-pandemic bounceback and many agents experiencing some of their best trading ever, has the time come to stamp out time-wasting clients who ask for quotes, then book elsewhere, or not at all?
Yes, was the resounding answer at the latest Grecotel Hotels & Resorts event organised in partnership with TTG Luxury, as agents gathered at the Royal Crescent Hotel in Bath.
“We are increasingly taking an appointment approach, going back to people who make enquiries and saying we are happy to go over everything and what they are looking for but it must be within an appointment – in the shop or over the phone/Zoom with us,” said Joseph Rajkovic, director, 2J’s Travel in Wedmore in Somerset.
“Not only does it allow us to use our time better, I think it shows you whether someone is serious about booking with you, helping to filter out time wasters,” added fellow 2J’s director John Wilson. “We can really try and manage our own time better now: it’s just a better allocation of us and what we care about.”
Marlborough-based Hannah Porter, director of Travel By Hannah, agreed, saying: “It’s those out-of-the-blue new queries you sometimes need to be wary of putting too much time into. But perhaps if more of us considered adding a £100 refundable fee to do the research for them, it would determine people’s real interest?”
The Top 50 Travel Agencies by TTG’s UK & Ireland’s No.1 Travel Agency said she was encouraging her team to really interrogate whether the booking was worthwhile and how to politely say no.
“We have developed scripts for this to help, as we want to be able to encourage agents to point out their worth – customers still sometimes don’t understand how a travel agency model works and where our revenue actually comes from. We are the experts providing a service and we need to train our staff with the confidence to express that.”
“I think that’s such a big bane of agents’ lives,” she added, “that they do a lot of research and then the client doesn’t book for whatever reason. But I’ve really been trying to put my foot down on what we devote time to and the team have had training on how to have those kinds of conversations.”
Among a landscape of agents enjoying buoyant times on the whole however, Rajkovic added there were still plenty of people keen to commit. “Nothing can replace last year – which was a fast-paced big year – but we are still seeing some very dynamic things happening: we’ve booked three-centre extravagant trips at the very last minute, and we booked around £75,000 of lates over the space of just nine days recently.”
Service counts
Kieran Miller, director, Magical Traveller highlighted that May had been his best year since he started trading, and agreed that professional standards needed to be better respected by clients. “Look at lawyers – no-one questions what it will cost to use their services. But I know it’s difficult to hold your ground and not give away too much information when clients ask, or discount.”
Claire Oliver, director, Luxury Dream Holidays said agents “really need to understand their worth”, while also explaining how the business works.
“We are specialists and need to be recognised as such – for example, if someone wants us to organise a high-end wedding and honeymoon involving a lot of work, there should be a £500 fee upfront,” she posed. “Of course, if it’s a simple point-to-point booking then it might not justify charging someone a fee for that, but people need our guidance on bigger and more complex bookings and that’s where we need to demonstrate our value.”
Porter said June had been a slow month, but for many understandable reasons. “The election, the Euros and the prospect of the Olympics on the horizon – these factors all definitely made us feel quieter,” she added.
“As things pick up, it feels as if expectations will be high, with people thinking they will be able to get whatever they want, but that’s not the case. People are still forward planning trips for next year too, which is good, some even into 2026.”
Summer optimism
Speaking of the summer season for Greece, Porter added “people definitely do want holidays to Greece, it’s definitely front of mind”. But she pointed out “everyone is mindful of how much prices have gone up across the board; people still need to know there are some bargains too”.
Marie Hurfurt, manager of Miles Morgan Travel in Bath, agreed the hotel market in Greece “has really moved on”. “There is so much choice now, from boutique places to sophisticated big-name brands and luxury all-inclusive options,” she said.
Yiannis Ioannou, business development manager for the UK and Ireland for Grecotel Hotels & Resorts and host of the event, said fam trips had been a big focus for the family-owned Greek hotel brand this year.
“Fam trips have been a big focus, with more to come in September and October and into 2025 as we appreciate how important it is for agents to have been to places and be able to share their personal experiences of resorts such as ours,” he said.
Agents reiterated that events such as the recent Grecotel one were crucial for them in building relationships. “These reliable points of contact and relationship building with suppliers is far more important to many agents like us than some incentives or vouchers. We don’t need that – we need to be able to pick up the phone and know someone is there to help; it’s all about service in luxury travel,” said Joseph Rajkovic of 2J’s Travel.
Agents were invited to a garden reception and an exclusive lunch with Grecotel at the Royal Crescent Hotel in Bath as part of a series of events in partnership with TTG Luxury.
The next event will be focused on agents around Yorkshire in the autumn.To join the Yorkshire event, agents should email for a place, and to see more images from the day, head over to see the full gallery.
Returning to the Kimpton Fitzroy, London
Agents and partners get to talk business together during one-to-one morning meetings at Luxpo, before diving into the latest luxury, travel and consumer trends in our half-day conference, the TTG Luxury Travel Summit.
Luxpo is free to attend for agents – apply for a place here
Final tickets are available for the Summit – get yours here
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