Old-fashioned hard work.

Seeing value in every customer.

Anticipating change.

Rejecting fear.

Respecting partners.

Enjoying people.

Three Italian-Canadian brothers used those ingredients as the recipe for one of Canada’s greatest travel industry success stories.

Enzo, Joe and Frank DeMarinis are the sons of an immigrant who arrived in Canada with no English and no money in his pockets, doing whatever he could do to provide for his family, including selling produce at flea markets.

“He did what he had to do to make it work,” said Frank. “He set the stage for his children to succeed. He never demonstrated fear. I think we took notice. We learned to find a way to make it work and not complain.”

Enzo was working at a restaurant at 18 when an uncle told him a travel agency was looking for help. “So I took that 50% pay cut and was there a couple of years,” Enzo laughs.

Along with a friend, he started his own agency, selling it as a going concern a couple of years later. Other friends hired Enzo to launch an agency called 2000 Travel, then in 1983, Enzo enlisted his brother Joe and the pair launched Belair Travel.

Belair began as a small ethnic agency, mostly selling flights to Italian-Canadians, with a trusty OAG in one hand and a landline in the other. But that was a seasonal market, so Enzo and Joe started seeking a way to fill out the calendar and decided to focus on the growing market for packaged vacations.

Joe suggested running 3” by 3” ads in the Toronto Star and Sun, and the phone started to ring. A year later, the brothers started thinking of expansion. They opened an office in Missisauga with another partner which “did extremely well,” Enzo says, and brother Frank joined the business shortly after, creating the triumvirate henceforth affectionately known as ‘The Belair Boys.’

“I learned under their wing,” says Frank. Things were still very much manual. We had one GDS terminal we had to share. Enzo adds: “We got into computers in 1993/1994. The only thing on the screen was a flashing cursor. You had to figure it out from there.”

Just two years later, Belair was one of the first companies to sign with Canadian travel technology innovator Softvoyage. “We’ve got to thank them,” says Enzo. “That software really helped Belair Travel explode.”

Joe notes that they were slightly surprised when the first Softvoyage software was all in the French language, but they dealt with it.

As pioneers in the online travel space, the Belair Boys knew clients were unlikely to immediately embrace a switch from traditional in-person transactions to trusting a computer to book their travel. To get customers to feel comfortable booking travel online, Belair backed up its website with a full call centre.

“We called every customer back. We’d verify all the details with them and they found that to be exceptional service,” says Frank.

“It’s more than just building a website. At the core is the highest standard of service, that sees value in each customer. You can’t just refer to the terms and conditions. We were flexible, hands-on, and every customer mattered. It cost us more money, but it helped build a trusted brand.”

Belair grew to seven locations and tens of millions in annual online sales. During a period when ‘vertical integration’ was the travel industry mantra, the North American Leisure Group inquired about buying the company. The brothers said no, but two years later in 2001 Frank says “we felt the time was right.”

Management at the time of the acquisition was aligned with the DeMarinis brothers’ vision for the company, so the brothers stayed on, but when that changed they decided to part ways.

A non-compete agreement kept the brothers out of the industry for a couple of years. For his part, Frank built a dozen homes during that time. When the agreement ended, Enzo called Frank, saying ‘What do you think about getting back in?”

In 2004, Red Tag was born. “I had missed the industry so much,” says Frank. But I wondered how we were going to be able to compete as independents with the big boys. We had to be different and we believed that by integrating technology, we could be a differentiator.”

Red Tag focused on the Internet and building a website that would give more flexibility to the customer. The results were beyond expectation.

“It took us 18 months to build the same book of business we sold after 18 years with Belair. We knew we were onto something extraordinary,” says Frank.

“We leveraged as much technology as was possible in 2004 and we were doubling sales year over year. Technology was the pillar. Several years later people caught up, but we were leaps and bounds ahead.”

Red Tag began partnering with MLSE as a high-profile Toronto hockey and basketball sponsor in 2007. When success saw Red Tag grew to a size that they had “to look for other opportunities,” it bought ITravel2000 in 2016. The brothers say the two brands shared a similar core business but a different customer base.

In 2013, the DeMarinis were approached by the CEO of Thomas Cook, formerly NALG – the same company that acquired Belair back in 2001. Vertical integration had created a company with both large retail and wholesale brands, but management struggled to integrate them, and the overall operation was bleeding money. After seeking the brothers’ advice on where the industry was heading, the CEO called back six months later to say ‘You were bang on.’

He then asked if the brothers were interested in acquiring Sunquest along with several other brands. They were intrigued, but leery.

“It looked great from the outside, but when you opened the hood, there was trouble,” said Frank. In the year prior to the sale, the NALG brands had lost $25 million. “That gave any potential buyers the heebie-jeebies,” Frank says. “We had a different point of view. We believed we could turn a profit in the first year.”

So the Belair Boys made a deal. Due to legal issues with the purchase transaction, the new company dubbed TravelBrands was forced to enter the CCAA process that grants financially troubled corporations an opportunity to restructure. Debts were suspended, but the brothers vowed that all creditors would be paid back within a year – and they kept that promise.

“We vowed that no-one was going to take a haircut – agents, staff, suppliers – and no-one did,” says Frank. “Others would have seen that as an opportunity (to shed debt). But there are no shortcuts. We’re very grateful to people in the present and the past who worked in this industry. We had a track record of what we accomplished. When you’re in moments of crisis, that gets noticed.”

In the first year as TravelBrands, the company made a $1 million profit, representing a massive $26 million swing.

After another couple of strong years, TravelBrands was acquired by H.I.S. Group in 2019. Joe and Enzo have since retired from the travel business – for now at least. Joe says when he learned of the Canadian Travel Hall of Fame honour his first response was “I didn’t think I was that old. I might still have a comeback!”

One thing that’s returning for sure in 2022 is the TravelBrands Charity Golf Classic in support of the Sick Kids Foundation. Joe was operated on there as a child, and the family has developed close ties to the hospital while donating over $1.5 million.

Frank is still working as President & CEO of TravelBrands. “I love what I do. There’s still a lot that needs to be done. The industry is going through a digital transformation on how travel will be bought and consumed and I want to be part of that.”

“I’ve worked and played with the DeMarinis brothers for nearly 30 years, says John Kirk, TravelPulse Canada founder and creator of the Canadian Travel Hall of Fame. " I remember calling on them as BDM back in the early 90's at their Danforth office, having Pizza at their favourite spot two doors down, sipping Cognac in their office. I was always in awe of their work ethic. I was amazed at how honourable they were to suppliers and clients. They drove a hard bargain, but man did they deliver. There is a entire generation of BDM's who made their bonuses on the Belair volumes. One could argue, they brought a vision and fearlessness that carried the entire Canadian industry forward through some difficcult times. It has been amazing to have a front row seat to their journey. It will be an honour to have the " Belair Boys " back together, on stage, at our event on May 19th" concluded Kirk

The brothers all note that success didn’t come without sacrifice, especially for their loved ones.

“For 20 years we didn’t have dinner with our families,” says Frank. “But in reflection now, I wouldn’t change a thing. The industry has been good to our family and our family has been creative in advancing the industry as a whole.”

On entering the Canadian Travel Hall of Fame, Frank extends thanks from the whole DeMarinis clan. “We’re very grateful to the travel community that has continued to support us through all these years. Being ex-travel agents, we know they’re our lifeline. We’ve always tried to help agents work smarter, not harder, by integrating technology into the process.”