FRONTLINE
flying in business class. The Far East has always been my haven for that sort of travel – twinning Singapore with Kuala Lumpur is the best of both worlds.
Q. How did Covid affect your business? I started the business at the end of 2019, but in March 2020 everything came to a halt. It was a difficult time for me to run a business that was only a few months old. Luckily, customers were happy to keep deposits and full balances with me and trusted me to send them somewhere safe when I could. When I look back now, I see it as a bit of a blessing in disguise. It gave me the time to do a lot of training and networking over Zoom to turn a negative into a positive.
Q. How have you been dealing with the ongoing conflict in the Middle East? I had to rebook flights for clients in India, Mauritius, Malaysia and the Maldives, but the biggest challenge now is to switch-sell people from disrupted areas. I am the type of person who offers to help anybody, no matter if they booked through an agent. The difficult thing is that none of us holds a crystal ball, and we don’t know what is going to happen next.
GOPAL SHAH
The Leicester-based Not Just Travel franchisee shares his passion for
Playa Hotels & Resorts and lessons learnt from Covid. By Ella Sagar
Q. How did you get into travel? I have had a passion for travel from a young age, and then worked for corporate organisations, which involved a lot of international trips. I effectively became an unofficial travel agent for my team. I loved researching and it sparked my interest as an aviation geek. I’ve got about 16 hours of flying lessons under my belt at Coventry Airport. Then I was made redundant at the end of 2018, and I thought it was a second chance to do something I loved, which was own a travel business. I decided to take the plunge and set up the Not Just Travel franchise for Tailor My Travel.
Q. What sets your agency apart? I am all about the fine details and I’m known for trying to get the most out of life, which carries over into my holidays. I always encourage people to do twin or triple-centre holidays if they can. I urge clients to travel farther afield and get on a better aircraft to improve their experiences. If I can get someone in an economy class on an A380, then it feels like you are
24 16 APRIL 2026
Q. What is trending in sales at the moment? People do still want to book a holiday to get away, but now more to escape the negative news cycle and social media than before. I have spent a lot of time in my life visiting countries such as Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam and Malaysia, so that’s where my interests lie. I am switch-selling clients to destinations such as Barbados and St Lucia and have a huge influx of enquiries for the next few months, which is great because I believe the Caribbean needs more exposure. There has been massive financial investment in regenerating the offering there, and many properties have reopened in the past six months following Hurricane Melissa.
Q. What has been your biggest booking? My biggest was for a group of five travelling to east Asia for five weeks. It was a unique itinerary with business-class flights. They wanted to visit a remote island near Thailand that required two internal flights, a private transfer to a local jetty and a private yacht. I worked with Kirker and A&K to fulfil that booking.
Q. How do you find new clients and grow your business? It’s important for the business to reflect me as a person, so I put out social posts, webinars, video blogs and Facebook Lives so people know it is not a faceless business. I have never had a physical presence, but I converted my double garage into an office where I could host people, and replicated that in my outhouse in my new house in Leicester. My son has started at a different school and that has been another chance to expand my network to a new demographic.
HOW DID YOU BECOME A TOP SELLER FOR PLAYA HOTELS & RESORTS?
I was introduced to Playa Hotels & Resorts before Covid and admire the portfolio
of hotels. I started booking a few family and business itineraries with them, and had such positive momentum that without realising it began selling them to pretty much all my clients. In 2023, I attended the Peaks Performance Awards as a guest and to my shock won regional best seller for the brand. I was absolutely overjoyed. Last December, I went on a fam trip to Cancun for being one of the company’s highest earners in peaks. It was a fantastic opportunity and a phenomenal experience that has given me insider knowledge of multiple hotels, because we were shown
around by staff on the ground. I’ve only ever had positive feedback from clients about
the resorts, the amenities, the staff, the food and the safety, and it’s great to be able to represent destinations such as Mexico in a different light. I’m a huge ambassador for
the brand now and book a lot of clients there – it feels like a
breath of fresh air and what my luxury clients are looking for.
Gopal on fam trip to Cancun
travelweekly.co.uk
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52
