It was around the time of Vitruvian Partners’ investment in Travel Counsellors in 2018 that the company first set out an ambition to top annual sales of £1 billion.

The company had been bullish about meeting that target by the end of its most recent financial year, but fell a little short this time, reporting today (27 November) that total transactional value in the UK was £933 million in the 12 months to 31 October.

But with more than £350 million in forward sales already on the books for 2024, chief executive Steve Byrne feels confident of hitting the figure early in the next financial year.

“Within the next three to six months we should get there,” he says, talking to TTG at the group’s annual conference in Manchester, hinting he suspects it will be sooner rather than later.

Growth has been buoyed this year by Travel Counsellors making the first acquisition in its 30-year history when it bought up rival Holidaysplease in March.

Around 50 of Holidaysplease’s home-based agents have now migrated over to Travel Counsellors, while the remaining homeworkers and the franchisees within sister company The Holiday Franchise Company are still operating under the Holidaysplease brand, as part of the Hays IG group. But Byrne says there is no imperative that others must move over: “Six to seven months in, we’re really comfortable with where things are at.”

With the integration going so well, then, might further acquisitions be on the cards for 2024? “I don’t see M&A as being a primary driver of growth – but it is something we will look at, if it’s a company that is strategically and culturally aligned,” he admits.

Joining the club

Growth will also come from continued recruitment in 2024. Around 280 new TCs joined the community in the last 12 months (excluding Holidaysplease agents) – almost double the figure that joined in 2022. Travel Counsellors now offers seven clearly defined ways into the organisation, catering for new recruits with differing levels of experience and different areas of focus.

The ‘Return to Travel’ programme saw a surge in applications post-pandemic, Byrne says, but this year it has been the ‘Corporate’ programme for consultants with TMC experience, the ‘Travel Academy’ route for those with no experience, and the ‘Travel Trade’ programme for industry professionals who haven’t actively sold before, which have really driven growth.

“We’ve seen a real surge in people from a tailor-made touring background joining the community – and we’re a £450-million tour operator in our own right in the UK now,” Byrne points out.

Recruitment is unlikely to match this year’s levels, though. “Onboarding takes three to six months, so we’d know already if it was going to be quite such a big year for recruitment,” he explains. 

Then there’s Travel Counsellors’ international markets - with 80 TCs in Ireland and around a further 400 in the Netherlands, Belgium, South Africa and the UAE combined.

International sales contributed around 20% of the £933 million total, and Byrne says there are more opportunities for further expansion in the coming years. "Taking a 2-to-10 year perspective, I’m sure there will be more opportunities overseas for us," he confirms, though there are no announcements imminent. 

Instead, the real source of growth in 2024 – and beyond – is set to come from the existing TC community. The brand’s focus on the premium leisure market has seen average booking value climb by 10% this year to £4,903, and Byrne is very pleased to report that 700 members of the TC community recorded their strongest sales year ever.

There are outstanding individuals like Drew Palmer, named Top Performing Leisure TC of the year at the conference, who took 944 leisure bookings and turned over more than £4 million in leisure sales in the last 12 months. 

And with 1,500 UK-based TCs contributing to around £780 million of UK sales, that equates to more than £498,000 in sales per TC – eclipsing the average earnings of many other homeworking organisations. 

But Travel Counsellors is sure there is much more potential to unlock, which is where £15 million of investment in technology will come into play next year, with enhancements to Phenix, a new AI tool to drive efficiency, and a drive for TCs to package more multicentre trips in-house.

There will also be a focus on re-engaging with lapsed customers, and a major content creator project from head office to drive brand awareness, while enhanced training programmes such as “My Personal Best” will help TCs focus on “world class basic”, in order to drive not just revenue but customer satisfaction and profitability.

Balancing growth and community

There is some sense, though, that perhaps the company’s rapid growth and laser-focus on technology has allowed a little distance to creep in between the head office team and the TC community: one TC at the conference tells me she finds head office slower to get back to her on queries, for example, and another says she "would prefer to speak to a human". 

But there are new initiatives afoot to bridge any such gaps: a TC has been invited to join the last three of Travel Counsellors’ board meetings, to ensure their views and experiences are front and centre in decision making, and head office colleagues will be going to visit TCs in their home or business environment next year. Each TC is also to be given a designated individual at head office to offer them business development support.

With Travel Counsellors priding themselves on customer service, and going above and beyond to demonstrate customer care at all times, this did make for some contradictory advice at the conference. 

Guest speakers such as broadcaster Fearne Cotton told TCs they should "be kind to themselves" and know when to switch off from emails, while Paralympic swimmer Ellie Simmonds talked about prioritising her mental health – and yet the client testimonials flashed up on screen during conference invariably mentioned how valuable clients find it that their TC is “always at the end of the phone” and “available any time night or day”.

How then can service-focused travel agents, whether at Travel Counsellors or in any other agency business, navigate the pressure of caring for themselves while caring for their clients?

Byrne certainly acknowledges the contradiction. “I think [agents] have got to work it through in a way which is personal to [them], putting the right things in place to sustain [themselves] over a period of time,” he suggests, citing initiatives such as Travel Counsellors’ virtual “coffee mornings” as being successful in helping agents manage such pressures.

For Byrne and his team, they’re clear that caring for the TCs within their community, and facilitating them in caring for their clients, is the company’s number one goal for 2024. “Staying close to our TCs, asking them what the biggest problems they’re facing at the moment are, that’s how we’ll keep that sense of what’s really important,” Byrne says.