17 May, 2023

FCTG acquires well known Australian travel event

Edited by Travel Weekly

Flight Centre Travel Group has announced the acquisition of luxury travel event, ‘Luxperience’ from event management specialists, Diversified Communications Australia.

Luxperience will be positioned within the Group’s global Luxury Travel Collection, which includes the Travel Associates and Scott Dunn brands, and like those businesses, the well-known event will continue to operate on its own merits as a separate business entity and will not be brand-aligned.

James Kavanagh, Global CEO of Leisure for FCTG says the company saw the acquisition of the boutique event as an opportunity to strengthen its luxury leisure offering to suppliers, advisors and clients.

“Luxperience is very well-known in Australia and New Zealand, it has a strong reputation as a great quality annual hosted buyer event connecting high-end experiential travel advisors with elite suppliers.

“It is the only event of its kind in Australia and was therefore the right fit for the Group’s growing Luxury Travel Collection,” Kavanagh said.

“As we emerged from the pandemic and luxury travel began to rebound, we felt the addition of a bespoke, luxury B2B event like this would strengthen our portfolio and provide opportunities for business growth and diversification.”

The Luxperience brand and model has operated in Australia since 2012 to support the development of meaningful relationships between travel agents and buyers with the right suppliers, products, and experiences.

Travel agents must be pre-qualified and approved to attend based on their luxury sales history.

David Longman, Managing Director of Diversified Communications Australia said the business was pleased with the outcome, saying that Flight Centre Travel Group’s far-reaching products and partnerships would make the ideal platform to advance the Luxperience brand in the market.

“Diversified Communications is confident that FCTG is not only well placed to advance the Luxperience brand and leverage its far-reaching networks, luxury products and partnerships to ensure the sustainable growth of this incredible asset, but will also ensure that the strong brand equity that has been delivered will be continued with the same care and attention to detail that Luxperience is known for.”

To preserve the brand equity, brand reputation and to maintain consistency of relationships and connections, experienced Luxperience Event Director, Lynn Ormiston, will transfer across with the business and will continue to lead the portfolio and offering.

A boutique version of Luxperience will take place this year from 13 – 17 November 2023 at the International Convention Centre, Sydney.

The luxury, annual hosted buyer event was initially acquired by Diversified Communications Australia in 2017 from owner, Helen Lagos, and the company successfully ran the event in 2018 and 2019.

Well-subscribed virtual events followed in 2021 and 2022 during COVID.

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