Blog homeI see many retail travel agent trade press journalists refer to the travel industry. I see many events described as for the travel industry.
In the main, when people use this term, they mean the airlines, the hotel chains, the retail travel agents and assorted ancillary sales companies.
They hardly ever mean niche tour operators.
The travel industry is much much wider than this subset of transactional companies.
I begin to believe that the main retail travel trade journalists and event organisers have the mindset that the industry (hah, almost caught me saying it!) is made up from the companies that make up their readership and companies that send them press releases or buy exhibition stands..
Take for example this interesting news from YouTravel.com via TTG – it seems amazing to me that 95% of bookings are made via the trade (presumably retail travel agents). 95%. Wow a massive %.
No surprise that YouTravel are of interest to travel agents and hence get coverage in the retail travel agent trade press. Quite right to.
Lets look at the TourCMS customer base statistics – just 5% of bookings made to our small tour operator customers are trade sales. 5%. Yep – nearly are all direct sell companies. Hence apart from working with a travel technology provider (us!) they hardly ever come across any other company who people may describe as the travel industry.
[See the TourCMS statistics page]
These niche tour operators never get any coverage in any of the major trade press. They have no conferences aimed at them with topics that would be attractive to them. They are nearly 100% under the radar of retail travel agents and retail travel agent trade press.
BUT they are also in the our industry.
New industry definitions (well hardly new, but you know what I mean)
I would prefer to see the following generalised definitions used instead of the travel industry.
- The transport industry – e.g. any company selling a commoditised product – including airlines, train, and basic bed only hotels
- The holiday industry – e.g. companies selling aspirational or relaxing trips
- Activity companies – e.g. things you can do (may not be so relaxing as holidays!)
- The tourism industry – a collective term for getting people out and about enjoying themselves (everything except medical and business travel probably)
There are other terms that are equally annoying in this industry – Nanobreaks, staycation, babymoon etc…. for a good discussion on them head over to Travel Rants!
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This is a similar argument to one I had back in my days as a backpacker magazine editor.
The self-declared ‘Backpacker Industry’ consisted almost entirely of travel agencies, tour operators and hostel owners. They did (and probably still do) lots of talking shop, trying to stop money seeping out of said sectors of the industry. The level of self-absorbtion was staggering – particularly amongst hostel owners.
In the real world outside that bubble there are rental apartments, airlines – and particularly pubs and bars. These are significant sectors that backpackers spend money on, and were/ are virtually ignored by The Industry. That is when The Industry wasn’t trying to shut them down
For ‘Travel Industry’, it seems like same story, different cast. The big players could do well to look outside their own bubble occasionally.
I worked for one of those companies you refer to above for many years and it wasn’t until I left that I realised just how isolated we were from the rest of the “industry”.
Apart from a few agents all our sales were direct. We had virtually zero contact with anyone else. We would go to the WTM, meet our suppliers and apart from meetings with airlines, that would be as close as we would come to any contact with the UK industry. Our relationship was with our clients and we didn’t feel the need to have any relationship with anyone else.
You say “These niche tour operators never get any coverage in any of the major trade press. They have no conferences aimed at them with topics that would be attractive to them.”
I don’t think a lot of these companies feel any need to be part of a wider “industry”. What do they gain from it? If TTG or TW tried to feature them more, what would be the point? Most TTG and TW readers are agents so what is the point of featuring an operator that sells direct? Mostly they are under the radar of agents because they choose not to work with them.
Any conference aimed at them would be a hard sell and would struggle to get attendees. A lot of these companies are small and disparate in terms of product and location. I doubt many have a huge budget set aside for attending conferences.
What it does mean is that industry bodies such as Abta don’t really represent the industry. They only really represent the larger parts of it. How many of the companies you refer to will be going to the Abta conference in Barcelona?
Great post Alex!
As someone who doesnt work in any of the industries you mention, I always relate to it as the travel industry, because I assume that most consumers would relate to it as that.
I think we are all guilty of using jargon and terms in our content because you are so used to speaking it in your job. I remember at ITB in Berlin, sat there wondering what most of the jargon meant.