Former UK managing director Carl Burrows and head of marketing Michelle Laverick left Collette in March following a “strategic decision to restructure”.

The UK team is now led by head of sales Neil Sehmbhy and Stephen Mills, who is head of UK partnerships and business development.

Christian Leibl-Cote, Collette’s senior vice president, global business, told TTG: “In the UK, we’ve obviously made some changes.

"The new leadership team has been bringing us in the right direction.”

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But he admitted while the UK business was increasing sales in 2018, this growth was “not as fast as the other markets that we’re in”.

Leibl-Cote said the new UK management team had “done a great job and shown great leadership”.

“We’re expanding our sales team - it’s about building the foundation in the UK,” he added.

“We think there are great opportunities for 2019 and the discussions have been great. I think 2019 is going to be fantastic with the team we have now.

“We are looking to expand in the UK and we think Explorations is going to be great for the UK market. We want to make sure we continue to invest to grow.”

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Leibl-Cote also stressed the value of agents to Collette’s UK business.

“Travel agents are extremely important to us,” he said. “It’s where we do our business in the UK – the agent community has been a big supporter for Collette and we want to support them. They have been such great partners for us.

“We are creating training plans and sales plans for all our partners – plans are being set up, getting ready for 2019.”