The year-to-date saw Lusso record £24m in turnover, compared to £18m going into the pandemic. The operator’s average booking value has also risen to £20,000, up from £15,000 pre-pandemic.

Managing director James Weaver said while rising prices were a factor, he stressed the impact of existing agent partners developing their business with Lusso and new agents coming onboard. 

Weaver was speaking to TTG Luxury at Lusso’s UK Travel Agent Awards at Peckforton Castle in Cheshire (see below for all the winners). He said the operator is “always looking” to work with new agents, and to help drive business Lusso is recruiting for an additional business development manager. “It’s a key appointment for us, and hopefully it will give us further reach,” he added. 

Sales director Gareth Hulmston will also personally contact new agents, and the wider plan is to continue attending several trade events each month across the country. Word-of-mouth recommendations from existing trade partners have also helped attract new agents, and an incentive is being planned for Lusso’s turn-of-the-year campaign.

Weaver continued: “We deal with a lot of agents, and we’ve been blessed with some incredibly loyal agents over the years, but we know there’s so many more. We want new agents to give us a try, so we can wow them.” 

New products

Lusso has been steadily increasing its product range, having introduced Africa just before the pandemic, adding Europe in 2021 and Canada earlier this year. The USA brochure was released this year, with Europe set to be released this year, and Indian Ocean slated for later this year or early 2024.  

Operations director Mark Hibbert said Lusso plans to “delve deeper” into existing destinations in its portfolio, including south-east Asia.

“We know that there’s a lot of potential within a number of our product areas that we want to maximise over the next few years, which will obviously lead us to higher revenues,” he said. “At the same time, we need to be able to concentrate on the quality of that additional business and not just find that we’re just spreading ourselves more widely. The future is bright.”

Weaver also noted that the operator has started to see some polarisation in the market, explaining: “We get some incredible high-value bookings. But what we’re hearing from product managers and feedback in destinations, is that some of the entry-level luxury market is suffering a little bit – there is a little bit of a downturn. Some of those are travellers who were in a bit of a higher bracket and are now dropping down a bit.”

While Lusso’s forward business for June 2024 to May 2025 is currently 15% up year-on-year, Hibbert noted that 2023 has been “quite tough” for several of the operator’s long-standing products, such as the Indian Ocean and the Caribbean.

He continued: “It was always going to be the case after Covid, as people went to the same place for a few years, but now they have got the travel bug again and it’s all about the experiences they’ll have, and multi-generational holidays. People are planning all sorts of holidays, to all sorts of destinations. So it’s for us to be ready for that.”