It’s always about Win, Win, Win for The Travel Agent Next Door
The Travel Agent Next Door (TTAND) welcomed about 120 of its partners to its annual VIP Supplier Partner event at the Fairmont Royal York in Toronto last night as it celebrated those partnerships and updated suppliers on the latest news from the agency group.
TTAND founder, Flemming Friisdahl introduced the group’s team which has now grown to 82 full-time members – up from 73 in 2025 – and made it clear that if it wasn’t for the efforts of those team members, TTAND wouldn’t be the successful company that it is.
Those on hand also heard from Steve Byrne, Global CEO of Travel Counsellors, in a video message in which Byrne made it clear that the two organizations share the same “Win, Win, Win” philosophy and that Travel Counsellors job was to support Friisdahl and his team.
For his part, Friisdahl offered his audience updates on TTAND’s new lead generation initiatives with NextTrip and Journy TV that offer benefits to both the group’s advisors and to its supplier partners.
Friisdahl said that TTAND is doing different things in different areas of its business to get to the next level and, in the process, help both suppliers and advisors.
One area that has become increasingly important is bringing new talent into the industry.
TTAND’s VP New Talent Development Rhonda Stanley told the audience that ‘new-to-industry’ agents are “the future of the industry.”
Stanley made it clear that TTAND’s program is focussed on quality not quantity, observing that TTAND is “attracting career people in our recruitment process.”
The goal she said was to “find the right people for TTAND and for the industry.”
To ensure that, TTAND has a challenging training program and strict requirements on those accepted into it.
It is clearly working as Stanley shared with the supplier audience that eight of the agents who came out of the program have sold between $1 million and $3 million in the past year.
As for member growth, Jeff Element, TTAND’s COO, said that the group has seen its membership grow to 1,853 (that’s 910 primary agents and 945 associate agents) in 2026.
Element said that the group has been growing at a steady pace and by the end of 2027 expects to have 2,150 members.
On the dollar and cents side of things, Chris Senior, TTAND’s CFO, told the audience that the group’s growth has been “strong and consistent” as TTAND’s member agents have been successfully growing their businesses.
Senior also pointed out that TTAND is also seeing more growth in high value, luxury bookings by its advisor members.
And considering that LUXE by The Travel Agent Next Door, which was launched last year, has been a remarkable success, it’s not surprising that the groups is seeing a significant uptick in its advisors’ high value bookings.
A high point of the evening was Friisdahl’s update on Pencils for Kids, a charity that the group has supported for at least a dozen years, and which works to build classrooms and schools for children in Niger, West Africa.
Over the course of a dozen years, TTAND and its partners have raised $513, 394 that has helped to build classrooms, purchase books, transport and other necessary items to help with the education of children in Niger.
Praising suppliers for the support of the charity, Friisdahl told them that in 2027, the goal is to raise funds to build a primary school in the country.
In closing, Friisdahl thanked suppliers for their support, telling them “without you, we wouldn’t be here … you make a big difference and you make us who we are.”
And that’s all about Win, Win, Win … isn’t it …
