ALG Vacations Highlights Growth and Opportunity at 2023 Ascend

Image: ALG’s Ascend 2023 conference drew more than 650 travel advisor attendees. (Photo by Brian Major)
Image: ALG’s Ascend 2023 conference drew more than 650 travel advisor attendees. (Photo by Brian Major)
Brian Major
by Brian Major
Last updated: 3:55 PM ET, Fri October 20, 2023

"Dream Big, Travel Far" is the timely theme of this week’s ALG Vacations’ Ascend 2023 conference. The travel advisor and hospitality network giant premiered programs, initiatives and services designed to position its advisor members for continued success amidst surging consumer wanderlust.

“We think the most important job we have is to invest [in] you to make you better and make your businesses stronger,” said Mark Hoplamazian, president and CEO of Hyatt Hotels, which purchased ALG Vacations for $2.7 billion in late 2021.

Speaking to the more than 650 travel advisors in attendance at the four-day event in Cancun, Mexico, Hoplamazian said the organization’s scale is a valuable benefit for travel sellers.

“The first thing we have available to us is our volume. We served over 2.6 million passengers last year and for the first half of this year, 1.4 million passengers,” Hoplamazian said. “So we have volume [and] scale.”

ALG and Hyatt have also targeted potentially lucrative premium and luxury travelers, said Hoplamazian. “We serve a higher-end customer, so the average package revenue is $1,500 dollars, and that's up 13 percent year-over-year and up 24 percent from pre-pandemic times.”

Hoplamazian added, “We're continuing to push on that high-end traveler [and] the higher the value of the travel package, the higher the commissions, the higher revenue stream and the better and healthier your businesses are.”

He continued, “It's unambiguous in my mind that when you win, we win, [so] we're trying to make sure that we deepen our access to a lot of really high-end customers."

Pushing Profitability

He said the organization’s success is boosting advisors’ bottom-line results. "We are investing directly behind your businesses. In 2022 alone, we spent over $270 million in commissions and advisor rewards."

Ray Snisky and Mark Hoplamazian at Ascend 2023 conference

“The pandemic was a scary moment. It’s very rare when the revenue just turns off.” – Ray Snisky (left), with Hyatt president and CEO Mark Hoplamazian. (Photo by Brian Major)

The company is also launching technology tools to ease transitions for agencies, Hoplamazian said.

“In technology, we are improving the base every quarter that goes by. We’re working to make our platform more effective and more suited to what [advisors] do and allow you to have more powerful and more successful businesses,” he said.

“It’s a really good show,” said Nadia Henry, owner of award-winning luxury travel advisor firm Travel With Sparkle. “I like the value of not only connecting with the suppliers, but I like the value of the breakout sessions.

A conference session focused on “Using Social Media to Engage” was particularly valuable Henry said.

“I don’t do my social media; I hired a content creator,” she explained. “But there are little things in between that I wanted to learn how to do, and they showed us. There were so many things I learned on that panel that I didn’t know.”

Productive Partnerships

ALG’s ability to work cooperatively with travel advisors and its internal divisions enabled the organization to emerge strongly from the pandemic, said Ray Snisky, ALG’s group president, distribution. “The pandemic was a scary moment. It’s very rare when the revenue just turns off, so we had to have clarity and make sure everyone is aligned.”

Said Snisky, “My initial thought was, ‘Are we going to deal with a bunch of processes?’ You know this business, you have to move on time you have to be decisive. That was one of our great strengths; we’re very decisive.”

Jackie Marks at ALG Vacations' Ascend 2023 conference

“We never stop raising the bar or experimenting.” – ALG’s Jackie Marks. (Photo by Brian Major)

Snisky said ALG relied on its advisors to share information on their business needs and goals post-pandemic, and as a result, “The last two years has been record-breaking from the standpoint of delivery, we’re at four times the previous record of the company.”

The advisors who attended the gathering were part of an exclusive group, said Jackie Marks, executive vice president of ALG Vacations. “This conference actually sold out in three weeks; we have over 650 advisors here and over 200 suppliers and we have over 100 of our team members out there [and] 50 unique workshops to keep you learning and growing,” Marks said.

“I can tell you that does not include the hundreds and hundreds of advisors that sat on the waiting list hoping to get one of your spots now,” she said.

ALG has consistently worked to provide more value to its agency members, according to Marks. “We never stop raising the bar or experimenting,” she said.

“In fact, it is one of our values as part of Hyatt and I really think we've tried to do that in a lot of different ways. This past year we added CRM [customer relationship management] to our call center and added a speech analytics component to our quality assurance.”

The company has also expanded its global portfolio, said Marks. “A lot of you have seen we've been growing our European products. We added some more salespeople to help your businesses be strong and successful, and we've also invested millions of dollars into technology security and fraud prevention.”


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