Holiday Merchants, the travel agency which provides end to end solutions to its travel trade partners has 43 franchise offices across India with one office each in Nepal, Canada, USA and Kazakhstan. Started in the year 2009, the company offers global services in outbound packages, series departures, bespoke travel, FIT, leisure, incentive travel, conference management, visa facilitation, and business travellers. Speaking to Express TravelWorld, Vikas Khanduri, chief executive officer, Holiday Merchants, stated, “We want to be seen as the biggest consolidator for travel packages in Central Asia. This year we plan to create a network of 100 offices in India and abroad. The main focus will be on Middle East and African destinations as they are bound to do well in the coming year.”
Further discussing the plans for the year ahead, Khanduri, informed, “In the short haul destinations, the upcoming places will be Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Russia, Azarbaijan, Slovenia, Romania and Bulgaria. We will promote packages to these destinations as they have been unexplored by Indian travellers. For long haul destinations, we will be looking at South America and exotic island destinations like Australia, Bora Bora, New Zealand and Tahiti.”
Also heading Viva Voyages, the representation company, Khanduri plans to promote his partners in Tier II and Tier III cities. He stated, “Currently, Viva Voyages handles 14 countries namely Latin America, Hong Kong, Greece, Russia, Morroco, Kenya, Tanzania, Mexico, Nepal, New Zealand among others. We will request our partners to host travel educational programmes in Tier II and Tier III cities like Chandigarh, Surat, Lucknow to tap a diverse market in India.”
He added, “At the same time, under Holiday Merchants, we have started a Direct Selling Agents (DSA) programme which will enable people to sell packages by themselves. Many people like housewives, freelancers will get the chance to get the required destination knowledge and start selling travel packages. We are yet to finalise the process for the same.”