Category Archives: Agents

Yatra.com has announced the appointment of Mudit Shekhawat as Chief Marketing Officer of the company. He will be responsible for leading marketing activities, alliances and ancillary revenues across all Yatra.com business-lines and group entities. In addition to further strengthening Yatra’s brand positioning, he will also manage all consumer marketing initiatives across platforms to drive customer stickiness and loyalty. Commenting on the new appointment, Sharat Dhall, COO (B2C), Yatra.com said, “We are delighted to have Mudit come on board with us. As a veteran of the industry, he brings with him vast experience in digital and consumer marketing, which will spur additional growth for us and cement our position as India’s travel planner.” Shekhawat comes with rich consumer marketing experience of more than 12 years in the consumer internet space, most recently with Ola, where he was head of marketing. In his earlier stints, he has worked with Myntra, Yahoo and HCL Technologies in various marketing leadership roles. Shekhawat is an alumnus of IIT Madras, from where he went on to do a Masters in Engineering from Pennsylvania State University before finally finding his calling in marketing, and rounding it up with an MBA from ISB Hyderabad.

Tamarind Global has gone international by expanding its presence to Dubai, a huge source market for Indian weddings and events. The company already has a presence in Dubai for its tours vertical. It will now offer a bouquet of event and wedding services to support its domestic and international operations from the Dubai office. Weddings and events will be supported by destination selection, planning and budgeting, guest list and vendor management, hospitality, travel and logistics, décor, F&B, entertainment and fashion consultations for the bride and groom wear. Apart from this, MiCE events will also be supported. A team of two will start the base of operations at the Dubai office. Kunal Rai, Vice President – Events and Weddings, will head the Dubai vertical, “With the launch of our Dubai office, Tamarind now offers its services to a ‘global’ audience. We aim to lead the market by providing an all-inclusive bouquet of services to make each event unique, glamorous and memorable.” Elucidating on the reason for expanding to Dubai, he said, “With the progressive growth of the Middle East as a popular destination, Dubai is the best choice to set up a regional HQ. It will act as a start point that will drive maximum output to penetrate primarily the UAE and Middle East market.”  

Travel Air Representations, the B2B wholesale travel division of FCM Travel Solutions, has announced the launch of adventure travel brand, Intrepid Travel in India. It will distribute and promote Intrepid Travel products and services in India. Headquartered in Australia, Intrepid Travel has over 800 different itineraries across Europe, Asia, Africa, North & South America, the Middle East, Australia, and both the Arctic and Antarctica. Joseph K Jose, Vice President & Head – Wholesale, FCM Travel Solutions (India), said, “We are delighted to announce the launch of Intrepid Travel, yet another leading global travel brand, in India. The diverse offerings of Intrepid Travel have been well-received globally and will strengthen our endeavour to address unique requirements of India’s leisure traveller market. Through this collaboration, we aim to offer Intrepid Travel’s bouquet of travel products in the country while focusing on Tier -II and Tier-III markets.” On the partnership, Brett Mitchell, Regional Director – Asia Pacific, Intrepid Group, said “We look forward to working with Travel Air Representations to launch Intrepid Travel to the Indian market”.  Currently Travel Air Representations works with over 2100 agents (Business Partners) across 110 cities and towns in India, with a team of over 110 passionate and professional team members.”

Indian e-tail major Flipkart announced its tie-up with MakeMyTrip for travel bookings. “Through the partnership, users can now make travel bookings through MakeMyTrip’s services using Flipkart’s mobile application,” an official from MakeMyTrip said. The partnership will be rolled out with domestic flight bookings in the next few weeks, followed by hotels, bus and holiday bookings. The companies, however, did not specify the exact time frame for the rollout. “The partnership will help us reach out to an even wider consumer base through MakeMyTrip’s multiple travel booking sites — MakeMyTrip, Goibibo and redBus — and open up the online travel market significantly,” said Deep Kalra, Founder and Group Chief Executive Officer, MakeMyTrip. The tie-up also helps in furthering Flipkart’s goal of being a “one-stop destination” for all digital transactions, added Kalyan Krishnamurthy, CEO, Flipkart. The companies did not disclose the financial details of the partnership. Founded in 2007, Bengaluru-based e-commerce platform Flipkart claims to have a customer base of over 100 million in the country.

Thomas Cook (India) has announced the appointment of Romil Pant as Senior Vice President for its Leisure Business, both international and domestic. Pant comes with more than two decades of experience in operations and credit management across sectors, including, telecom, financial services and travel. In his role, Pant will provide leadership and functional expertise to drive productivity and results across the company’s leisure businesses, while focussing on Thomas Cook India’s omni channel growth strategy. Pant has previously worked with MakeMyTrip.com, Capital First, HSBC, Citi Financial and Essar Cellphones. He is a Masters in Finance from University of Delhi.

The maiden edition of Très RARE recorded over 100 Indian destination management companies and 30 foreign tour operators from the UK, US, France, Germany and Italy. Instituted by RARE India, the event was a showcase of the finest boutique hotels, lodges, hideaways, camps and retreats in India, Nepal, and Bhutan that aimed to engage with the bespoke tour operators and media from India and overseas, alongside an eclectic mix of world travellers. Conducted over two days, the event focused on intensive one-on-one engagement, knowledge building and innovations. The close interactions with hotel owners and hosts were followed by 11 hosted familiarisation trips across India. The event also hosted speakers on hospitality and related topics to add value to the concept of experiential travel in the sub-continent. Sowmya R Vijaymohan, Partner at RARE India said, “This is probably the first green event where no plastic has been used, thus following the green document. It is a tribute to all the bespoke boutique hotels. These boutique hotels inspired us at RARE to break away from the traditional and create an intimate showcase that focuses on the niche rather than the mass and mainstream.” Some of the hotels which participated at Tres Rare were RAAS Jodhpur in Rajasthan, Bhainsrorgarh Fort, Rajasthan, Hotel Druk, Bhutan, Pepper Trail, Kerela, Tiger Mountain Pokhara Lodge, Nepal, Deccan Odyssey, etc.

Thomas Cook (India) has strengthened its presence in Mumbai with the opening of a new franchise ‘Gold Circle Partner’ outlet at Opera House. This brings Thomas Cook India’s total number of outlets to 21 consumer access centres with nine owned branches, 12 Gold Circle Partner (franchise) outlets in Mumbai, 38 consumer access centres with 15 owned branches and 23 Gold Circle Partner (franchise) outlets in Maharashtra. Thomas Cook India’s internal data has highlighted that Mumbai continues to feature as a top and growing source market for its holiday business. Hence, in an initiative to harness this opportunity, the company identified Opera House, Mumbai as a high potential location to set up its new Gold Circle Partner franchise outlets. The Thomas Cook Gold Circle Partner programme is an exclusive franchise partner initiative that increases the brand’s presence reach across the country, giving consumers access to the company’s products and services in metros/mini-metros and emerging Tier-II and III markets. A Gold Circle Partner is equipped with sales and marketing support. Rajeev Kale, President & Country Head – Leisure Travel & MiCE, Thomas Cook (India) said, “Mumbai has been identified as a prime growth driver and continues to deliver strong growth of 30% YoY for our leisure travel business. Thomas Cook’s data has highlighted South Mumbai as a high potential source market for its holiday business.”

With an array of cruising choices on offer for the discerning travellers, the Globus family of brands is celebrating its 90 years of operation in the travel business. In 2018, the company plans to showcase its nine-decade journey through a revamped corporate website and is also offering a discount of five per cent on all Globus Europe vacations. Varesh Chopra, Regional Director – South Asia and Middle East, says, “Our journey began 90 years ago on March 28, 1928 & now, nine decades later we are still paddling, steering and cruising travelers across the world through the wonders of six continents. We want to thank all our agent partners for being such a strong support for us through this journey. Without them, we would not have been able to achieve this huge success. We want everyone to be able to celebrate this landmark anniversary with us and hopefully toast with us to another 90 years. On this occasion, we are offering five per cent off on all our Globus Europe vacations.”

Travel Tours, the flagship leisure travel brand of FCM Travel Solutions, has inaugurated their second retail and first franchise store at Salt Lake City, Kolkata. The store was inaugurated by Shravan Gupta, Executive Director – Leisure Businesses, FCM Travel Solutions and Sitaram Sharma, President, Bharat Chamber of Commerce & The Consular General of Belarus. With the launch of this store, FCM Travel Solutions now has 28 operational Travel Tours stores across India. The new Travel Tours store in Kolkata aims at redefining travel experience from the region by focusing on both tailor-made vacations and group holidays catering to different kinds of travellers in the city. Spread over 1200 sq. ft., the outlet at Salt Lake City will cater to needs of up-market urban consumers – families, business travellers, honeymoon couples and groups of travellers. The new retail outlet will offer a range of products and services – domestic and international flights, customised and group holidays, hotels, car transfers, visa, cruise vacations, honeymoon packages, adventure holidays and more. Commenting on the launch, Gupta said, “Our second store in Kolkata is a reiteration of our strategic intent at Travel Tours, FCM to expand our footprint across key markets in East India. Through this launch, we aim to provide unbeatable travel experiences to our patrons in an untapped market.”    

Tamarind Global has announced the launch of a wedding division at its Delhi office. After the exponential growth of its weddings and events division of Tamarind Global in Mumbai, the company now looks forward to tapping the flourishing wedding business in Delhi-NCR. Tamarind Global’s Delhi office already offers event management and MiCE services. The division will be led by Karan Malhotra, Head – Events and Weddings, Tamarind Global. Kunal Rai, VP, Events and Weddings, Tamarind Global, said, “This strategic expansion has always been on the cards for us. We are excited it is finally coming to fruition and we can have a dedicated presence catering to our already growing client base in Delhi. Delhi-NCR is prominent for the size and scale of its thriving wedding and events business, making the move of securing a strong presence in the region an inevitable progression. A team of 10 people has already successfully executed one wedding. This fully fledged team is geared to provide hospitality and logistics services as well as client servicing support for turnkey wedding and event solutions for Delhi and other North markets. The aim is to increase the team size to handle multiple weddings, and pitch for new weddings in the region.”