21 Jul
2022

A day to celebrate agents

Tomorrow (Friday 22 July) sees the third National Travel Agent Day. It’s an initiative devised by one of our tour operator Members, Intrepid, to celebrate the great work which travel agents do and to encourage consumers to book their holiday through a travel agent.

Most agents find themselves in a much better financial position, and with a more stable outlook, than they did at the time of National Travel Agent Day last year. I’m so proud of all our travel agent Members who have come through such difficult times. 

It’s hard to find many positives from the pandemic for Members, but one of them surely has to be that people are now rediscovering the benefits of booking with experts – because of their knowledge, experience and the reassurance which many people feel from consulting agents about their next trip.

Our regular consumer sentiment research shows that people are now 37% more likely to book with a travel professional now than before the pandemic began.

Anyone celebrating National Travel Agent Day is encouraged to share what they’re doing on social media, using the hashtag #NTADUK.

We’re getting involved too and our charity ABTA LifeLine, with Intrepid’s support, has developed its own campaign to coincide with the day. ‘Go troppo for LifeLine’ is a call for everyone in the travel industry – not just agents – to put on their favourite tropical shirt tomorrow to raise money for agents and others in the travel industry who’ve fallen on hard times.

We’ll be sharing on social media pictures of ABTA colleagues doing just that and it would be great to see yours too. If you want to get involved, there’s all the detail you need at National Travel Agent Day – Go troppo for LifeLine. You can donate directly at TravelCares – Go tropical for LifeLine – JustGiving and a social media pack of assets you can use to promote your activity can be downloaded here.

Mark Tanzer, Chief Executive