Davidson will head up Flexi Reps alongside Kelly Freeth, a travel agent with more than 20 years’ experience. The pair will be supported by Andy Freeth as a non-executive director. 

Davidson said he wanted to offer brands a flexible field sales solution for product launches and incentive awareness, as the coronavirus crisis continues. 

Flexi Reps is initially planning to target businesses looking for a trade boost, with many brands having let their field sales teams go in recent months.

Davidson said: “We want to help brands raise awareness with cost effective solutions, keeps travel industry colleagues busy and support industry recognised charities.” 

He is looking for any field salespeople who have recently been made redundant to sign up with the agency and is keen to talk to any businesses wanting flexible trade sales support. 

“We know brands will want to have a presence amongst agents but may not be able to justify year-round sales teams in the current climate,” he said. 

“We aim to be a the place to go for companies needing temporary resource. 

“Our flexible resourcing means businesses can tap into high calibre reps who can deliver their USPs at a fraction of the annual cost. 

“We can work with tourist boards, hotel groups, cruise companies, tour operators and airlines to generate noise about product launches, incentives, brochure launches or even simply to instil confidence in their new Covid-19 protocols. 

“Customer confidence in travelling is key and travel agents are the best placed to offer consumers advice.”

Kelly Freeth added: “I have met hundreds of reps over the years and they really add value to businesses by training agents and raising awareness. 

“I completely understand why brands have had to cut back and from a travel agent’s perspective it’s really sad to see. But with our flexible solution we can keep agents trained, informed and connected to brands with short-burst activity.”

Andy Freeth added: “Craig and Kelly have hugely complimentary skills to make this work. 

“They have an operator and agent view and lots of experience to deliver effective and impactful activity.” 

In the first 24 months the brand pledges to give 10% of all profits to Abta LifeLine. Every year after this it’ll pledge to a new trade charity.