Irish escorted tours and group specialist Travel Department is in talks with several UK agency consortia as it looks to build on a period of “exponential growth”.
The company began courting the UK trade in 2023, initially working with Barrhead Travel in Scotland, followed by partnerships with Oasis Travel in Northern Ireland and several Aito agents in England.
Chief executive James Coughlan said the operator is now looking to grow its UK footprint through more trade partnerships, having just become a member of the Association of Touring & Adventure Suppliers (Atas).
“We’re in talks with a number of consortia about broadening our distribution and hope to announce developments in the next few weeks,” said Coughlan, who joined from Abercrombie & Kent in February 2024.
“We’re gradually building our profile in the UK and we’ve had some really encouraging results.” Travel Department’s portfolio ranges from European tours to long-haul itineraries, active holidays, short breaks, tailor-made tours for small groups, solos travel and river cruise.
Founded in Ireland in 1996, the company is also growing its international reach. It now sells its product to the Canadian and Australian markets and a US launch is on the horizon.
“We’re working with a partner who is distributing our product through agent partners in those destinations and we’re seeing a really encouraging upturn in bookings,” added Coughlan.
“We hope to be in a position to launch within the US this year.”
Travel Department recruited Gemma Walker as trade sales manager for Scotland and Brian Fulton as key account and business development manager for Northern Ireland earlier this year. It also upgraded its agent booking portal.
“Gemma and Brian are doing a fantastic job building relationships with the trade and we’re seeing huge growth in those markets,” added Coughlan, who hinted there could be further trade-facing appointments in future.
The agency is “reviewing further opportunities to drive greater share from the UK trade”, he said, which “in the future may lead to the business increasing its trade sales team on the road to support these initiatives”.
Coughlan reported “exponential” year-on-year growth in river cruise bookings, with sales up by about 60%, and identified active holidays as another potential growth area.
