Virtuoso Chief Operating Office Brad Bourland was in AU/NZ recently to meet with members and partners. Bourland and other Virtuoso executives spoke to Karryon Luxury in Sydney about the group’s worldwide growth and its member-led ethos.
With only recently having attended the 36th annual Virtuoso Travel Week in Las Vegas, COO Brad Bourland was on the road again, visiting Australia and New Zealand to meet with travel advisor members and partners.
Karryon Luxury headed to The Langham Sydney to meet with Bourland and other Virtuoso executives including Michael Londregan, Senior Vice President, Global Operations; Greg Treasure, General Manager, Australia & New Zealand at Virtuoso; Sharyn Kitchener, Managing Director at Mosman Travel and newly appointed Chair of Virtuoso’s Australia and New Zealand Member Advisory Board; and Zoe Dean, Marketing Director, Australia and New Zealand.
The discussion focused on the growth of the Virtuoso community and its expansion into eight regions, with significant growth outside the U.S; key trends including multi-generational travel, and the rise of independent contractors; upcoming events for AU/NZ members; and the importance of technology in enhancing advisor efficiency.
Global growth of the Virtuoso community
Bourland spoke of how pre-pandemic, Virtuoso was a very US-led business but since then, they’ve heavily focused on how they globalise the business in relevant ways for each region.
“That’s led to the global growth that we’ve been experiencing. We expected to see growth over maybe three to five years, but it’s felt more like three to five months! We had a little bit of an idea that it might work that way with the work Michael Londregan had done here in this region originally. We put general managers and built teams in each one of the regions and the growth has been significant,” he said.
Londregan confirmed that they’ve been outstripping 2019 figures now in 2023 and 2024.
“We almost don’t look at 2019 as a benchmark anymore. We’ve had double digit growth as a network. In that period, yes, we’ve seen some increasing in pricing, but we also took the opportunity to think Virtuoso is a good idea: getting the best of the industry to work with the best consumers, to create the best experiences….that isn’t actually an American idea, it’s just a good idea,” said Longregan.
Since the Pandemic, Virtuoso has seen growth in Latin America; established an entire separate business unit in Canada; seen expansion in UK, Ireland, Europe and Asia; and recently opened up in the Middle East.
“Now, we have eight regions where probably only two existed in any real sense before Covid. The US business is growing and thriving, but the majority of our overall growth is coming from the rest of the world and right now, over half of our travel agency members and half of our advisors are actually outside of the USA,” said Londregan.
“Our growth is really coming from expanding to other markets where we’ve got the right conditions, consumer, travel agency partners, and partners,” said Londregan.
Trends and insights from Virtuoso Travel Week
In Bourland’s role, he closely examines what the trends are in the world: economically, geopolitically, and anything that would affect people’s ability to physically move amongst around the world.
“What we found is that Virtuoso travellers are still spending significantly more than even the advised traveller. I think that lends to the quality of our advisors, because they’re able to really gain access and create things that are not an ‘off-the-rack’ kind of experience, but a very unique and exclusive type of travel – those are some of the areas that I know we’ve been focused on,” said Bourland.
The rapid growth of multi-generational travel has been encouraging, with Bourland stating it is the first time in history where there are five generations of families travelling together; and there’s longer-length holidays thanks to the ability to conduct business while travelling.
Growth of experiential travel and attracting new talent to the industry
Sharyn Kitchener says that travel advisors learned a lot from the pandemic, with positives gained including valuing their professionalism a lot more.
Londregan added that good agents figured out their value proposition, being transparent with their fees and talking about their value – and the market was willing to listen.
“The good ones started to promote the fact that you don’t just use me in case something goes wrong, you use me because a whole lot more goes right. And this is a very yin and yang part of the new travel advisor going forward,” he said.
The luxury travel business, Virtuoso says, is growing at three times the normal GDP rate.
“We’re going to need to attract a lot of talent to our industry, and the fact that they are professional and the business model does stack up. This is a career about service, imagination, relationships, flexibility and great remuneration,” said Londregan.
“One of the trends discussed at Virtuoso Travel Week, that Matthew Upchurch speaks about, is that he’s never seen more career switches….from lawyers, doctors, professional financial advisors. I think the big trend is that we reinvented ourselves a little bit. You really get that feeling when you hear people talk with transparency and pride about the business,” he said.
Greg Treasure added that there’s been a strong rise of the independent contractor.
“These people are leaving other professions and are able to run their own business in the luxury space. From a remuneration point of view, they are able to make as much money as they were in other professions,” said Treasure.
Professional development and networking
One of the values of being within Virtuoso, Sharyn Kitchener says, is the access to the global community and being able to talk to counterparts from all over the world.
“We do get to network at Virtuoso Travel Week and Symposium, and of course, if you’re lucky enough to be able to go to Chairman’s event where you do speak to the senior level of management, of owner managers, which is really another level. It’s very valuable,” says Kitchener.
She recalls having a client some years ago who was going to a destination in the US she wasn’t overly familiar with and she needed some advice – so she reached out to some of the local Virtuoso advisors in that region.
“They were so helpful. You may not know the person, but because you’ve got that contact and that word – Virtuoso – it does open a lot of doors. And it doesn’t have to be with just a supplier, but it can be one-on-one with another travel advisor in the group,” she said.
Bourland says that as they expand in other markets, such as the Middle East for instance, they firmly reiterate the ethos of Virtuoso as a community and network. CEO Upchurch makes it clear, says Bourland, that those who only want to ‘take’ need not apply.
“That’s the roots of Virtuoso with its very beginnings being a group of advisors getting together and saying we need to group up and to be more efficient and effective, we need to combine our expertise. That is really the power of Virtuoso,” said Bourland.
The strength of the Regional Advisory Boards
Sharyn Kitchener, who is the newly appointed Chair of Virtuoso’s Australia and New Zealand Regional Member Advisory Board (RMAB), says that the Board allows this region to have a real voice at global level.
“Each of our RMAB members meet either monthly or bimonthly with their global counterparts. We filter information from global and then we work out what we’re doing on a regional basis, then talk about it for the Australia, New Zealand community as well,” said Kitchener.
Londregan says that another key benefit of the RMAB is the opportunity it affords Virtuoso to stay close to the end customer.
“All companies that really want to put the customer at the centre of their business need to find a way to get close to the customer. The way we do that is by collaborating with the people who sit constantly with the customer face to face,” said Londregan.
Events for 2025
Greg Treasure, who has been with Virtuoso for six months, says the events are really where he’s been able to see the community come together.
“The power and the energy, and not only from our members, but our partners…you really see it come to fruition at the events,” said Treasure.
The Owner Managers forum will kick off the local event calendar in 2025 in February, in Perth.
On Tour Hotels & Resorts, Cruise and Destination events will also take place in various capital cities in 2025.
Connects Events run in smaller cities such as Perth, Adelaide and Auckland and they include professional development opportunities for attendees.
“Not everybody has the time or sometimes the funds to be able to go to Virtuoso Travel Week, so having the opportunities throughout the year, you can go to all of these events instead,” says Kitchener.
Technology and innovation
Londregan says that there is a continued push for technology, systems and processes that will allow member advisors to be more efficient.
“We’ve been working very hard on aggregating and collecting data from the industry in general, and also from our members and partners, so that we’re better informed to make better decisions about how to work smarter, not harder,” he said.
Virtuoso is focused on data, segmentation, and tech that enhances what advisors do – not replacing what they do.
“We asked how we can give an advisor like Sharyn a CRM system that helps her better understand her clients, understand the predictive analysis of where they go, marketing to them, talking to them and sending them stories. So the tech is now coming in to help the human side of the business be better at delivering a human outcome – not to replace humans from the process,” said Londregan.
Treasure added: “I think Matthew Upchurch says, ‘automate the predictable, humanise the exceptional’. Where we add value is that human element, and the stuff that we’re not adding value to is where we can automate,” said Treasure.
For more information, visit virtuoso.com
