The Top Travel Trends and What it Means for Timeshare!
For this highly relevant RDO9 session, two travel experts will present what the public is beginning to expect and demand from their travel experiences. Speaking at this session will be Richard Aston – Director Deal Advisory at KPMG LLP and Victoria Bacon – Director of Brand and Business Development at ABTA, both of whom have a wealth of knowledge and experience in this field.
Richard is responsible for KPMG’s mid-market UK travel and leisure team across the UK. For the past 15 years he has focused on deals, working with both B2C and B2B businesses and has been in charge of a number of key transactions such as with Travel Republic, On The Beach, Cruise.co.uk, Leisure Pass, Big Bus, ATPi and Reed and McKay. Richard leads KPMG’s relationship with Thomas Cook and supports a number of growing travel businesses as they look to expand.
After Victoria initially joining ABTA in January 2011 as Head of Communications, now, within her role as Director of Brand and Business Development, she leads the Association’s communications, marketing, events and business development teams. In a poll of leading business brands, ABTA has been voted both a Consumer and Business Superbrand. Victoria previously worked at Future plc, a FTSE-listed global consumer media company, where she was Head of Group Communications, before joining ABTA.
During this session Richard and Victoria will focus on recent research reports showing today’s expectations and demands from the public for their holiday experiences in terms of destinations, value, things-to-do and technology. This will be highly relevant for attendees of RDO9 because it will offer insights and perspective on how to better meet the needs of the modern traveller which have changed in many ways from previous generations, and continues to shift based on the previously mentioned factors and more.
Following their presentation, Jackie Murphy – Managing Director at Flagship Consulting Ltd will lead a discussion with Richard and Victoria and a panel of top developers, Hassan Kadbi – CEO Hapimag and Stefan Mende – Sales Director, Anfi Group, about these predictions, and how our industry can both respond to these findings and more importantly meet the expectations of today’s holidaymakers.
Jackie Murphy founded Flagship Consulting Ltd over 25 years ago, and has worked with the timeshare industry for even longer, supporting developers, exchange companies RDO in reputation management. Jackie’s experience with clients extends beyond the timeshare industry into travel and leisure including cruise lines, hotel groups, tour operators and technology businesses.
Hassan Kadbi originates from Lebanon and joined Hapimag as Resort Manager in Bodrum back in 2005. Since then he has held several different positions within the company including Area Manager to Chief Resorts Officer, before being appointed as CEO in November 2016. Prior to working at Hapimag, Hassan worked in various management positions in different international companies such as Hilton.
Stefan Mende is originally from Munich, Germany. After previously working within the automotive industry, including several years at Audi/Volkswagen, in 2005 he shifted to the Sales and Management of timeshare operations and developments, subsequently working in the Middle East and Europe. Stefan now lives and works in Gran Canaria, after being appointed Sales Director for the Anfi Group there.
Connect with:
Richard Aston – Linkedin
Victoria Bacon – Linkedin, Twitter
Jackie Murphy – Linkedin, Twitter
Hassan Kadbi – Linkedin, Twitter
Stefan Mende – Linkedin
We would like to offer a big thanks to our Platinum sponsors, Interval International and RCI and our Gold level sponsors, Dial An Exchange, Light Enterprises and Shawbrook Bank. Without our sponsors each year the event wouldn’t be possible so we are extremely grateful for their amazing support.
