TPI Eyes Higher Margins
The annual TPI summit meeting hit Toronto on Wednesday (June 10) as part of a nine-city tour across Canada including pit stops in Vancouver, Ottawa, Halifax and St. John’s.
Featuring information sessions, presentations from suppliers and trade shows, company vice-president Tim Morgan says the purpose of the events are to connect with advisers and to provide updates on what’s going on at TPI.
“The main thing in terms of where we’re at right now is that business is good so we’re seeing growth in terms of travel sales, which is fantastic,” Morgan told PressToday. “We’re seeing growth particularly in the cruise segment, mainly river cruises, on the group side with ITC, and on the FIT side, so those are the main areas of travel product focus for us.”
While the majority of the company’s business remains ITC, Morgan says the cruise and FIT segments are growing at a faster rate.
As TPI approaches a new corporate fiscal year in August, it will focus more on margins by having members understand their margins, by setting targets and making sure they’re constantly growing.
“It’s great to have high sales, but it’s more important to put money in our advisers’ pockets,” he says. “It’s about finding the travel product that will help you increase your margin so again mainly the cruise side, luxury, insurance, those higher margin products.”
As members of Virtuoso, TPI will also focus on increasing premium or luxury travel through the network.
With many suppliers headquartered in the GTA, Morgan says the Toronto date is the largest of the city stops, which feature suppliers like Air Canada, Transat Holidays and Westjet Vacations. He expects attendance to reach around 300 members across the tour.
“Really, where we’re at is that business is good, we’ve had great sales success and in the future we’re trying even more to translate that sales success into commission and margin success for our advisers,” he adds.
Pictured at the Toronto trade show are TPI’s Morgan and Steve Ruddy, COO & SVP finance.
