The consortium’s Cruise Club was launched in 2013, and held its second cruise conference last week in Birmingham, attended by around 120 delegates.
Si Morris-Green said he was thrilled at the increase and interest from members, with the Cruise Club now comprising 156 agencies, but admitted he had strong ambitions to continue the growth next year.
“I would like to get to 300 members by the end of next year,” he told TTG. “I’m confident we have a great product and offering.”
Morris-Green revealed a number of initiatives to help achieve this figure. These include a focus on “digitalisation and personalisation”, enabling the consortium to target agents’ customers on behalf of the agencies, as with its “VIP Cruise days”, whereby customers are invited to ship visits hosted by the Travel Network Group’s Cruise Club team.
“We’ll organise them from start to finish, and we’ll even film the customers onboard or the agents if they come too, and we’ll then give that film to the agencies so that they are able to offer their own virtual tours to other customers,” Morris-Green said.
The Club will also host “supper clubs”, which Morris-Green described as “intimate events for around 18 agents”, which will be hosted by a cruise line and will enable agents to have a more personal relationship with the lines.
In addition, Morris-Green said there would be workshops on offer around the country, which he said would be interactive and “more hands on”, as well as two monthly webinars offering members product updates from cruise lines about the latest trends. “We want to keep our members engaged with the lines,” he added.
To ensure that members are happy with the offering, Morris-Green said the consortium would be holding four events around the UK next week to discuss the Club with agents.
Elsewhere, he told members that the consortium would be reintroducing ticket wallets and luggage labels for customers.
The Travel Network Group has also announced a tie-up with Belleair that will enable members of the consortium’s Cruise Club to offer customers more complex itineraries.
Morris-Green said members were already able to dynamically package under the consortium’s Atol, but added that the partnership with Belleair meant that members could offer more sophisticated packages.
“If it’s a tour and cruise and a more complicated itinerary Belleair will be able to do it,” he said.
