It’s been just a few weeks since Angela Mayall was crowned Luxury Travel Designer of the Year at the TTG Luxury Travel Awards 2024, and the news still hasn’t sunk in.
“I’m still on a high from that day!” she says. “Having worked incredibly hard in the luxury field for so many years this really is the icing on the cake for my business.”
It was well deserved icing. Since joining Designer Travel in 2008, Mayall has made a name for herself as one of the sector’s most passionate independent agents. A self-described ‘control freak’, she will go to any length to delight her clients in her pursuit to make every holiday an unforgettable experience.
Today, she holds a 98% repeat booking rate, a statistic most agents would love to emulate. In 2023, she celebrated a record-breaking year, shattering her previous sales record by 26% during the judging period for the TTG Luxury Travel Awards.
Mayall says several of her clients have been loyal to her for more than 15 years, and with some paying over £150,000 for their trips, have come to view her as more of an essential travel confidant than an agent.
But success hasn’t come easy: Mayall acknowledges her lack of work-life balance was something she did little to address up until fairly recently, when she decided to take on some admin support last year to great effect.
Now having raised the bar when it comes to what a luxury agent could be achieving, she puts her incredible success down to a range of key things when it comes to selling high-end holidays – here’s how she does it.
1. Become an expert
For luxury travel clients, expertise is the expectation. With so much information and conflicting opinions online, guests are paying for advice that is tried-and-tested by a professional they can trust, Mayall says. “Knowledge of the product and destination goes without saying.”
But Designer Travel is taking things one step further, mindful there is no better way to develop this expertise than going on targeted trips then sharing the content, with the company launching its On Location initiative last year, which involves sending people to properties to document every detail of the experience.
“Our managing director, Amanda Matthews, secures two or three night deals at various locations around the world,” Mayall explains. “But it’s far from a free holiday! We buy our own flights as a commitment, and after that, there’s a focus on delivering results. You get a full script of what you need to do when you’re there and you capture every moment through pictures and videos.”
She adds that not only does this allow staff to familiarise themselves with the property, but it also builds trust between the agency and its clients. A key aspect of On Location is posting the trip on Designer Travel’s Instagram and TikTok accounts, which provides visual evidence of advisors experiencing the destination for themselves.
Mayall says she hopes that this practice will catch on in the industry, insisting that there’s not enough agents sharing their expertise on social media.
“You get all the influencers out there, which can be good or bad, but we are the experts,” she says. “Why are we not in front of the camera? We know what we’re talking about. We need to put our necks on the line, and cross over that scary line of putting ourselves out there.”
Mayall also insists it’s important to continue educating yourself on the industry and staying on top of the latest trends.
“I’m always learning,” she says. “I’m constantly keeping up to date with new locations and new hotels. I never say no, and although I specialise in the luxury side of the market, I never turn down something new. Any luxury supplier courses or training I get involved in I do so, unless I’m out of the country.”
2. Know Your client
“Go above and beyond,” Mayall advises. “I really take the time to know about my clients to develop a long lasting relationship.” She adds that this open communication allows her to pre-empt clients’ needs and wants, ensuring she is ‘always one step ahead of them’.
“For an anniversary stay, I’ve organised cakes and floral arrangements in couples’ hotel rooms that replicated what they had at their wedding,” she says. Other ‘wow’ experiences Mayall has helped to arrange include the gifting of an expensive watch to a business client, and a tropical cinema spectacle with a client’s favourite rose wine. “It’s little surprises that set you apart,” she explains.
Having a face-to-face consultation, for Mayall, is also key. She prefers to skip a questionnaire approach, which she finds ‘too impersonal’, and get to know her clients the old fashioned way.
“If it’s a new client, I do my best to meet up with them,” she says. “We discuss everything – what they don’t like, what they’ve done before, what’s upset them in the past. It’s not a script, you need to be intuitive and read between the lines, picking up exactly on what you think they’re going to love.”
3. Prioritise suppliers
Mayall knows that pulling off the dream luxury trip is a team effort, which is why she invests a huge amount of time building relationships with suppliers.
“I travel with them any time I get the opportunity. It’s critical because my knowledge is enhanced but I also meet the right people who are absolute experts in that field. If I need that support because they’ve got more knowledge than I’ve got, I have that contact,” she explains.
Mayall also highlights the importance of attending industry events, where “you can have a representative from 10 different parts of the world under one roof”. As well as being a source for product knowledge, they can also be a lifeline when things don’t go to plan.
“The contacts are invaluable,” she says. “I know if I have an issue with a hotel, I have this person on Whatsapp. It would take years to travel all around the world to build all those contacts! I love to have one trusted contact at every luxury tour operator, that I know if I had a problem and was working at 11pm at night, they would be on board with me about sorting it. People buy people. It all goes back to relationships.”
• Watch the highlights from the TTG Luxury Travel Awards 20204, where Designer Travel also picked up the award for Luxury Homeworking Business of the Year (large).
