Home TTJ Spotlight Features Representation Businesses Stay Ahead of the Curve with Forward-Thinking Approach

Representation Businesses Stay Ahead of the Curve with Forward-Thinking Approach

Representation Businesses Stay Ahead of the Curve with Forward-Thinking Approach

As India’s travel market continues to evolve, representation businesses are adapting to meet the growing demand for personalised, sustainable, and immersive experiences. These companies leverage innovation, partnerships, and deep local insights to navigate challenges, anticipate emerging trends, and ensure their clients stay competitive in a dynamic and rapidly changing market. Let us hear from some representation stakeholders about their key challenges and milestones in 2024 and what they foresee for 2025.

Collaborative Approach to Boost Visibility

Pranav Kapadia, Director, Global Destinations

Pranav Kapadia

Navigating 2024 Challenges: Competing in the global travel market demands constant innovation. At Global Destinations, we focus on forming strong partnerships with airlines, trade organisations, and local tourism partners. This collaborative approach boosts visibility and allows us to create immersive travel experiences that resonate with Indian travellers. Understanding market nuances ensures our clients stay competitive with insights that meet evolving needs.

Emerging Trends in 2025: The Indian travel market is undergoing a transformation, with a clear shift toward more personalised and immersive experiences. Indian travellers seek more profound connections with destinations and engage with local cultures authentically. Sustainability is also rising in importance, with eco-friendly stays and responsible travel choices becoming top priorities. The middle class, which refrained from travelling in 2024, is expected to drive significant growth in 2025. We are preparing by offering strategies that align with these trends, helping clients cater to this demand for intentional travel experiences.

Beyond Traditional Representation: Going beyond traditional representation services is imperative in today’s fast-paced travel industry. At Global Destinations, we build long-term relationships with DMCs, hotels, and tourism boards. These connections enable us to deliver consistent value, and our market understanding allows us to design customised strategies tailored to our client’s goals. Initiatives like our Global Destinations roadshow and valuable market insights ensure that our partners maximise their presence in India’s vibrant travel market.

A Dual B2C and B2B Strategy: India’s vast and multifaceted market requires a comprehensive approach. I advise international tourist offices to develop a strategy that blends B2C and B2B efforts. Connecting with consumers through captivating marketing campaigns is essential, but engaging with the travel trade community is equally important. At Global Destinations, we ensure our clients not only spark interest but also equip the Indian travel trade with the tools to convert that interest into bookings. This dual approach builds visibility, trust, and long-term success for our clients in India.

Strategies that Blend Sustainability, Innovation, and Cultural Insight

Hemant Mediratta, Founder, One Rep Global

Hemant Mediratta

Addressing Challenges in 2024: At One Rep Global, we stayed ahead of the competition by expanding beyond traditional traveller segments. We identified emerging interest groups, such as younger audiences seeking shopping, wellness, and adventure experiences. We helped our clients tap into new opportunities by tailoring strategies to these demographics. With personalised travel growing, we adapted by launching innovative campaigns on social media. We also addressed cultural alignment issues by providing training and creating region-specific marketing materials to ensure authenticity. External challenges, like visa delays, were mitigated by our proactive approach, ensuring continued success for our clients.

Trends for 2025: Looking ahead, the Indian travel market is being reshaped by its young population, with 65 per cent under 35. Gen Z and millennials are driving new travel preferences, prioritising personalisation, sustainability, and authenticity. Gen Z primarily seeks adventurous, culturally immersive experiences. Younger travellers balance affordability with enriching, value-driven travel. Sustainability and wellness are key priorities, with eco-conscious travellers favouring green destinations and wellness tourism. Social media plays a dominant role in travel inspiration, making digital-first campaigns essential. We use data-driven research to anticipate market shifts and craft tailored strategies to meet these evolving preferences.

Differentiation in a Competitive Landscape: To differentiate ourselves, we work closely with clients to craft strategies that blend sustainability, innovation, and cultural insight. We guide clients in adopting eco-conscious practices, exemplified by Potato Head Bali’s zero-waste philosophy and Botanic Sanctuary Antwerp’s green initiatives. These efforts attract eco-conscious travellers and position clients as leaders in sustainable tourism. We also prioritise digital engagement, helping clients adopt advanced booking systems and AI-driven personalisation. Combining storytelling with actionable insights ensures our clients build strong, meaningful brands that resonate with modern travellers.

Advice for International Tourist Offices: India’s diversity requires a localised approach. Replicating global strategies does not work; cultural and economic nuances must be considered to build authentic connections. With over 700 million internet users, India’s digital market is essential for reaching younger demographics. At One Rep Global, our hub-and-spoke model covers 25 key cities across India, offering deep local insights. By leveraging our network of agents and influencers, we help international tourist offices craft relevant campaigns that cater to regional preferences while maintaining a cohesive national presence. Focusing on localisation, digital engagement, and sustainability ensures international offices tap into India’s potential successfully.

Focused on Innovation and Customisation for the Dynamic Indian Market

Priyanka Nijhawan, Director-Representations, Nijhawan Group

Priyanka Nijhawan

Key Challenges in 2024: In 2024, the need for constant innovation in trade engagement, evolving traveller preferences, varied segmentation and newer trends called for dynamic strategic activations to touchbase on key needs of the Indian travellers while at the same time educating the travel trade on our latest product offerings. To stay abreast of these ever-changing needs and stay ahead in a competitive landscape, we tailored our initiatives to highlight the USPs of our clients by organising focused roadshows, bespoke events, webinars, trainings and expanding engagement with MICE and wedding partners.

Strategies to Capitalise on Emerging Trends: The Indian travel market is rapidly evolving with a growing demand for family getaways, short-haul trips, eco-friendly travel, immersive experiences, and new traveller segments such as women-only groups, DINKs, senior citizens, solo travellers, and millennial/Gen-Z audiences seeking music festivals and concerts. To accommodate these changing tastes, our clients, including Mandapa, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve, Kempinski Hotels, and others, are creating customised experiences to meet traveller expectations while tailoring amenities for Indian tourists, such as a wide variety of food options and multi-generational lodgings. To meet these new demands, our strategy prioritises leveraging influencer relationships, executing digital campaigns, and expanding our reach to luxury travel partners in Tier II and III cities, recognising their growing economic importance and contribution to the Indian outbound travel market.

Differentiating Services to Strengthen Market Position: Our strategy centres on customisation, local outreach, and innovation. By delivering bespoke solutions, exploring growth markets, and leveraging analytics, we help clients achieve distinct recognition. Programmes like agent loyalty rewards, interactive online promotions, and positioning sustainability as a USP enhance our value. Clear reporting builds credibility and showcases results. With offices in Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, and Mumbai, and plans to expand into Tier I and Tier II cities, we tap into emerging opportunities. Our blend of dynamic young talent and seasoned professionals with over 25 years of experience sets us apart in the industry.

For a Stronger Foothold in the Indian Market: India’s rapidly changing travel industry, demands constant innovation and localised strategies. As a representation partner, we provide our partners market insights, facilitate trade engagement, and manage 360-degree campaigns that involve regular sales calls, on-ground marketing activations, influence campaigns, media relations, online trainings, webinars, bespoke networking events, trainings over lunch, festive gifting for relationship building, flash sales and offers. By organising FAM trips and representing clients at flagship events like SATTE and OTM, we act as an on-ground ally, ensuring visibility and seamless execution. To keep our international offices ahead of the curve, we also design offers and seasonal packages tailored to the Indian festive/holiday calendar.

Adaptation to Emerging Trends and Consumer Preferences in 2025

Alefiya Singh, Director, IRIS Reps

Alefiya Singh

Challenges in 2024: Iris Reps tackled challenges last year by focusing on education and innovation. A key challenge was ensuring that travel agents understood the unique offerings of our represented destinations. We addressed this by conducting targeted training sessions, webinars, and one-on-one meetings, empowering agents to promote our products confidently. As Indian travellers sought more experiential journeys, we adapted by adding trending, immersive experiences to our portfolio. Our participation in trade shows and exhibitions enhanced visibility and strengthened our network. We also added exceptional properties like NOOE Resort in the Maldives to meet the growing demand for upscale travel.

Emerging Trends for 2025: Looking ahead to 2025, there is a shift toward wellness retreats, adventure tourism, and family vacations among Indian travellers. In response, we introduced tailored packages to cater to these preferences. Strategic collaborations with airlines, DMCs, and associations like UTEN and OTOAI helped us engage a wider audience through FAM trips, roadshows, and webinars. Our sales strategy also focused on expanding into Tier II cities, tapping into their growing potential. Globally, we bolstered our presence by participating in trade shows like ATM and WTM. We also launched Green Meetings for Regal and Regala Hotels in India, aligning with the rising trend of sustainable travel.

Tailored Experiences: In a competitive market, Iris Reps differentiates itself by offering highly personalised, tailored travel experiences. We focus on expanding our portfolio with unique, lesser-known destinations and sustainable travel options. By offering customised itineraries for wellness, adventure, and family travel, we cater to specific demands. Strengthening partnerships with airlines, DMCs, and tourism boards ensures comprehensive, seamless travel solutions. Increased visibility through digital campaigns and influencer collaborations will further connect us with Indian travellers in innovative ways.

Embrace Local Insights for Success in India: Understanding local preferences and cultural nuances is essential for international offices seeking to strengthen their presence in India. Personalisation and tailored travel experiences are key. We offer valuable local insights, industry connections, and market trends to help international brands succeed. Our expertise in promotional strategies and established relationships with local stakeholders ensure international offices adapt to Indian travellers’ evolving needs.

Advancing Through Technology and Data-Driven Insights

Prabhakar Kamat, Business Head, Red Dot Representations

Prabhakar Kamat

Key Milestones in 2024: In 2024, Red Dot Representation made significant strides by expanding its portfolio with new destinations that cater to evolving Indian traveller preferences. A significant milestone was the successful launch of our experiential roadshow, which connected international partners with Indian travel agents and fostered valuable collaborations. Additionally, we strengthened our digital marketing efforts, creating tailored campaigns that boosted engagement and bookings. These milestones ensured optimal visibility and success for our partners.

Impact of Evolving Demand for Outbound Travel: The growing demand for unique outbound travel shaped how we supported our clients. We introduced customised packages focused on wellness retreats, adventure tourism, and cultural experiences tailored to Indian visitors. We also began offering virtual destination showcases and leveraged data-driven tools to predict traveller preferences, helping clients craft offerings that resonated with their target audience. We ensured our clients remained competitive through training sessions and workshops with travel agents.

Differentiation in a Competitive Market: What sets Red Dot Representation apart is our personalised approach and deep cultural understanding of Indian travellers and international destinations. We craft strategies that highlight each destination’s unique appeal, offering long-term solutions rather than short-term fixes. Our strong network within the travel trade ensures seamless collaborations, while our use of digital tools enhances visibility for our partners. By building genuine relationships with clients, we become trusted partners in their growth, positioning us ahead in a competitive sector.

Priorities for 2025: Our focus this year will be on expanding into emerging markets while enhancing offerings in established destinations, with a strong emphasis on sustainable and experiential tourism. We aim to support clients in creating eco-conscious and personalised experiences that align with changing consumer values. We are investing in technology such as AI-driven insights and data analytics to address industry challenges, predict trends, and optimise offerings. We will continue fostering collaborations with the travel trade through workshops and events, ensuring we remain adaptable in a dynamic tourism landscape.