The need to build a more diverse workforce was also addressed as well as dealing with the sector’s loss of talent among other impacts of the Covid crisis on travel firms. 

During the session at Abta’s Travel Convention – entitled Navigating the next normal – Mark Colley, managing director of independent agency Sunways Travel, said he believed giving out fewer discounts could allow travel firms to offer more attractive wages.

Colley said the current issues to attract new talent into the industry was “a huge problem”, admitting it was “not easy to increase wages with low margins”. 

However he urged fellow agents to place higher value on their skills and services in a bid to improve the situation.

“We as an industry do have this discount culture and I do wonder whether that will go away now,” he said. “I’m trying to encourage my sales team not to discount and promote the value that you’re adding to the whole experience of someone booking – the fact we’re there for them 24/7 – and drive that value home. 

“The minute we stop giving half our commission away – then we can pay our staff better.”

The need to recruit a more diverse workforce was also on the agenda for both G Adventures managing director EMEA Brian Young and Celebrity Cruises vice-president and managing director EMEA Jo Rzymowska.

Young said G had used the pandemic to “properly reset” its diversity and inclusion strategy and despite having to make “very tough decisions” to downsize its workforce, he hoped the new approach would allow the operator to “build back better”.

He revealed G had hired an external specialist to run company-wide research into its diversity and inclusion policies – with changes to how it recruited and methods on making its branding more inclusive introduced.

Rzymowska said she felt it was “up to all of us in the industry” to encourage younger people to join – but admitted the sector “needs to do better to become more diverse”.

“The best advice was ever given was ‘don’t hire the best person for the job – hire the best person for the team’ – the best teams are the most diverse teams,” she said.

Meanwhile Young said he saw a desire by consumers for greater flexibility from travel firms as being a key issue for companies to adapt to post-Covid.

“We have to think about customer behaviour and expectations and we have to work around that,” he said.  “Flexibility is the new normal. That’s really important – consumers will continue to expect that,” agreed Rzymowska. 

Colley said he had felt that from an agent’s point of view – telling the conference his business would not work again with suppliers who had not been there when they were most needed during the pandemic.

He also revealed from a recent meeting with British Airways that the airline was “seriously considering” keeping its “book with confidence” scheme “indefinitely” after seeing the value of offering the option to customers.

“[I think] a lot of tour operators and airlines will keep those policies in place,” he said. “We need to remember the end game in all of this, which is our customers.”