Explore chief: ‘I don't see a ceiling for our relationship with agents’
Sarah DennisExplore Worldwide anticipates up to 40% of its sales could come through the trade “in the next couple of years”.
The adventure specialist, which currently achieves around a quarter of its UK sales through agents, also sees a need for “one more business development-type role” with growth in trade sales outpacing B2C, managing director Michael Edwards tells TTG.
Speaking after Explore this week reported it had already surpassed its 2023 financial result halfway through its current financial year, Edwards highlights the trade’s contribution and people’s desire for experience-led travel as two factors driving the result, as well as the adventure travel sector’s growing maturity.
"We’re already a few per cent ahead of 2023’s full-year [result], although January is a big time for us," he explains. "But we get solid bookings throughout the year, and we’ll exceed last year by some considerable distance.
“Since the pandemic, people are really valuing experiences and bringing those bucket-list holidays forward. They’re seizing the day a little because they don’t know if something like [the pandemic] is going to happen again.”
Explore’s 2024 sales as of Tuesday (9 April) are up a third (33%) on the same period in 2019. However, Edwards stresses the first half of the current financial year wasn’t without its challenges.
He cites the ongoing conflict in the Middle East as a block on bookings for the region, particularly anticipated top seller Jordan, and the cyber-attack on parent company Hotelplan UK at the end of last year.
“It was not just the inability to trade, but the recovery – all credit to our technology team for getting that back. We would have been further ahead otherwise,” he reveals.
‘Can’t thank agents enough’
Edwards highlights the investment Explore has made in its people, training and technology for its progress, as well as efforts to “beef up” its trade marketing with one member of the team dedicated to agents. He is full of praise for Explore’s trade partners.
“I can’t thank them enough – those relationships have really deepened," he continues. "Travel agents are fantastic at conceptualising experiences, people really see the value of travel agents post-pandemic.
“I don’t see a ceiling [for sales through agents] – I can only see that getting stronger.”
He adds the operator’s two business development managers are “out there on the road” visiting trade partners, supported by a recent hire of another business development support team member.
But he also talks up Explore’s online training offering for agents, and “continuous” fam trip programme. He points too to its new Explorer magazine, which is available to all agent partners and currently on its fourth issue, as ways to help agents inspire their clients.
Edwards clearly identifies three main drivers for the operator’s growth in agent sales – consumer desire for smaller, more intimate group travel, and agents’ enthusiasm for adventure-led holidays being two of them. The third, he says, comes from Explore and other specialists "banging the drum" for adventure travel.
“We’re all competitors, but we share a similar passion," he says. "All of us are in agencies, all the time, promoting the experience of our kind of travel."
Edwards says Explore has enjoyed “two amazing seasons” of sales for travel in Europe, which he attributes to a desire for “safe” travel that is closer to home, but he also insists long-haul destinations are “coming back”.
“Asia is coming back, people are going back there in numbers. India is well and truly back, as is Sri Lanka, and then there are those traditional bucket-list destinations like the Arctic, Borneo or Peru.”
He also highlights a growing popularity in newer destinations, such as Albania. “It’’s amazing that there are destinations closer to home that are still developing and emerging. Europe is really starting to broaden out,” he enthuses.
Explore, which became B Corp Certified in February, is adamant that while sustainable travel is not a number one priority for consumers at the moment, it will become a factor in future holiday choices. A self-styled “wizened veteran” of adventure travel, Edwards is clear on his priorities.
“At the end of the day, we sell holidays and we don’t pretend otherwise, but I do genuinely feel that people come back with more than a holiday," he explains.
“I come from that generation where travel started to become cheaper and easier and I want my daughter to have those experiences. Now we have to travel sustainably to preserve that experience for future generations.”
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Sarah Dennis
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