In this week’s dispatch, Travel Leaders Network (TLN) announces a host of new travel partners; details of Virtuoso new report on sustainable travel, and its leadership award winners in the space for their contributions, and First in Service (F1S) returns to its roots in Los Angeles.
Travel Leaders Network
Travel Leaders Network reports that it has added 19 new travel suppliers this past year. This expansion of diverse travel supplier partners – including cruise, air, car, rail, global destinations and specialized tour operators – aims to address the growing needs of Travel Leaders Network’s member agencies, says the organization. Notably, TLN says it has significantly expanded its airline portfolio, which now includes 23 airline partners.
New Canadian suppliers include Air Transat, Bahia Principe Hotels & Resorts, Boatsetter, Blue Bay Hotels, Cathay Pacific, Croatian National Tourist Board, Core Travel Technologies, Costa Rica Tourist Board, Couples Resorts, Crystal Cruise Lines, Karisma Hotels & Resorts, Korea Tourism, Nassau/Paradise Island, PromPeru Canada, Santo Domingo Tourism, Switzerland Tourism, Tenerife, Turismo Madrid, and WestJet Airlines.
“While our membership as a whole is already quite strong, these new suppliers are crucial additions to our network and will help bolster our organization,” said Christine James, Travel Leaders Network’s VP, Canada.
Virtuoso
Released at its recent Travel Week in Las Vegas, the ‘Virtuoso Impact Report: Sustainable Travel 2024,’ based on a survey of 50 question to nearly 500 Virtuoso global partners, presents a database of sustainable practices that can be used to identify trends and insights from the luxury perspective.
Key insights from this year’s report include:
- The Virtuoso partners that participated collectively represent over 7,000 sustainability initiatives – a 43% increase compared to last year — that support Virtuoso’s three pillars of sustainability: Protecting the Planet (47%), Celebrating & Honoring Cultures (34%) and Supporting Local Economies (19%).
- The surveyed Virtuoso partners collectively created over 385,000 jobs in their local communities.
- The surveyed partners donate an average of $460 per visitor to local artisans, NGOs and other businesses and individuals. A total of 22% of the partners’ revenue goes back into their local economy.
- 88% of surveyed Virtuoso advisors (spanning owners and managers, independent contactors and agency staff) see selling sustainable travel as a business opportunity.
- Seventy% of advisors say they are knowledgeable in sustainable travel, 61% are confident or very confident in talking about sustainability with partners and clients, and 55% say their business is focused on sustainability.
- If clients understand a partner’s sustainability initiatives, 66% of advisors say their clients are willing to increase their spend.
- Of Virtuoso’s three pillars of sustainability, advisors say 46% of their clients are more inclined to support local economies, 30% to protect the planet and 24% to celebrate culture.
Meanwhile, Virtuoso also announced its Sustainable Leadership Awards, which included the following winners:
- Protecting the Planet: Wilderness, for its “Conservancy Rhino Ranger Program” in Namibia’s Palmwag Concession to protect endangered black rhinos.
- Supporting Local Economies: Big Five Tours & Expeditions, Inc., which runs the “Kipi Robotic Education Program,” which addresses poverty alleviation, cultural heritage and education by using Kipi, a multilingual robot that teaches school curriculum in over 20 indigenous dialects in Peru, keeping children away from cartels and illegal mining.
- Celebrating Culture: Abercrombie & Kent Vietnam, for its Digging Deeper in Cambodia” project has dug 1,300 wells in rural Cambodia, where 20% of the population lacks safe water and 13% of deaths are related to unsafe water or inadequate sanitation.
First in Service (F1S)
First in Service (F1S), one of North America’s largest independent travel agencies, opened a new office in Los Angeles earlier this month with more than 200 guests, including F1S advisors – particularly those specializing in entertainment industry and luxury leisure travel – as well as clients and industry partners.
The new office is strategically located in the heart of the entertainment industry in Culver City and marked marks the final reopening of the company’s legacy offices, which were temporarily closed during the pandemic.
First in Service’s LA presence dates to 2014, when the company first opened offices at the Santa Monica airport hangar before relocating to Beverly Hills. The return of an active Los Angeles location and the move to Culver City signify the company’s continued growth and commitment to serving the entertainment and luxury leisure markets, says the organization.