Optimism for the future was at the forefront as global luxury travel network Virtuoso held two recent in-person events for Canadian members, advisors and partners.

‘On Tour Toronto’ was held on April 27-28 at the newly renovated Park Hyatt Toronto, with 92 advisors and 61 partners attending for networking and professional development.

Virtuoso says networking sessions were met with optimism and positivity after such a prolonged shutdown period for Canada. “There was a palpable buzz in the room that brimmed with opportunity for the future of travel for the region,” the company said in a statement.

As well, the first-ever ‘Canada Forum’ for 30 owner/managers and 15 partners was held on April 29. Agency executives came together to examine trends, collaborate on agency hiring and development of talent, discuss how to help their businesses recover and how to leverage relationships with Preferred Supplier Partners.

Over the course of three days, Virtuoso’s On Tour and Canada Forum events played host to one-to-one networking appointments, professional development courses, and keynote sessions.

These included a deep dive on how to communicate and build relationships with different generations of travellers, including Baby Boomers, Generation X and Millennials.

Despite recent challenges, Virtuoso reports that attendees see great potential for 2022. Virtuoso attributed the health of future bookings as a reason to be bullish. A February Virtuoso quick poll revealed that 71% of travellers have booked travel already for 2022 and 86% plan on travelling internationally in the near future.

In an exclusive session for agency owners and managers at Canada Forum, Virtuoso’s COO, Brad Bourland, SVP, Global Operations, Michael Londregan and SVP, Network Products & Events Jennifer Campbell sat down with newly appointed Una O’Leary, General Manager, Canada to discuss global strategy.

“The commitment to grow the business in support of the Canadian traveller is a key focus for the region as we head into travel’s resurgence in Canada,” Virtuoso said.

Bourland spoke about Canada’s outbound and domestic growth which saw a major boost as restrictions eased in March 2022.

“Based on Tourism Economics 2022 data, globally we expect to see that international leisure travel will reach full recovery against 2019 sometime towards the end of 2023. In Canada, outbound travel is projected to recover to 2019 levels by mid 2024.”

Londregan and Campbell spoke of the organization’s digital transformation aimed at attracting and engaging more consumers in support of its members and partners.

Newly enhanced, the digital version of the Best of the Best hotel catalogue, the online cruise experience, and tours space has led to increased traffic to Virtuoso.com and users driven to personalized agency and advisor private label sites has grown by almost 230%.