As part of the largest expansion of its sales team in the
history of the company, Trafalgar is hiring seven new sales staffers, predominantly
serving the East Coast.
"Our sales traditionally have been quite even, East
Coast and West Coast. We just see more opportunity on the East Coast, so we're
going to be increasing the coverage on the East Coast," said Trafalgar president
Paul Wiseman.
He added, "For 16 years, we've seen agency numbers
decline up until around 18 months ago, where it leveled out. And now we're
seeing an increase and there definitely seems to a bias on the East Coast on
the number of new entrants. That's primarily home-based."
Consequently, Trafalgar is in the process of recruiting and
hiring five district sales managers and two sales directors with a focus on
East Coast sales, although some will have territories that include the central
and western U.S.
The move is part of a larger investment that Trafalgar's
parent company, The Travel Corporation, is making on the East Coast with a new
Manhattan office that is set to open in early 2017. The Travel Corporation will
add a total of 18 new people to its team in that office.
The Travel Corporation, which owns Trafalgar, Insight
Vacations, Uniworld Boutique River Cruise Collection, Contiki and African
Travel among others, has long had U.S. offices in several locations throughout
Southern California.
Trafalgar's sales team overhaul has been in the works for
well over a year, according to Wiseman, who added that it was well-timed
considering that the company is experiencing "amazing growth right now."
"We've been waiting for it," he added. "Things
weren't healthy during the election build-up and we were hoping we would see
wave month come on strong. We didn't expect that it would be wave tsunami,
which has been fantastic."
Currently, Trafalgar's bookings are up 17% over 2013, which
was the company's best year since the financial crisis. Leading that growth has
been a strong rebound in Europe bookings, sparked by a strong dollar, a return
in consumer confidence and low airfares.
Added Wiseman, "Airfares are very low, and that's a
huge driver of business. With low airfares, the rate that we can close the
bookings goes sky high. The customer is hearing what the airfare is and just
booking. Because of all that, the number of definite departures in our program
is approaching 90%."