Agents hail success of collaboration with Race Across The World winners

Two agents have hailed the success of a collaboration with two Race Across The World winners after the four women sailed an A-Rosa River Cruise together.

Michelle Stammers, a Brilliant Travel homeworker who runs The Travel Genius in Sutton Coldfield, and her fellow Brilliant Travel agent Carrie Gibson, who is based in Lichfield, teamed up with Cathie Rowe and Tricia Sail after Stammers met the TV stars at last September’s Barrhead Travel conference in Palma, Majorca, and approached them about a collaboration to boost her travel business.

The four women embarked on a seven-night Southern Rhine Experience Cruise at the end of May, which sailed round-trip from Cologne and called at Rudesheim, Speyer, Breisach, Basel, Strasbourg and Mainz.

More: A-Rosa offers agents 25 cruises in ‘biggest ever’ booking incentive

It was the first time any of the group members had taken a river cruise and they documented their experience with daily social media posts and videos to tell viewers what they had been doing.

“The trip was better than any of us expected and well exceeded what we thought it would be like,” said Stammers.

“Every day was different and offered up something new to do or see; castle, cities, rolling landscapes, it was just magical.”

Stammers said the response to the social media posts was “brilliant”, with “great engagement” from followers across all her platforms, which has prompted increased enquiries.

“We’ve seen an uptick in enquiries which is great and we will be working hard to convert these into bookings,” she said.

“You simply can’t beat first-hand knowledge of a product and we can’t wait to start making plans and using this to keep the messaging going over future months.

“This experience showed me that taking our followers with us on our own personal journey as we experienced something new was a really great way to involve and inspire them.”

Asked whether the pair had further collaborations in mind, Stammers said: “Yes, we do. This one with A-Rosa as such a success and we are so grateful that they were so open to and supportive of our idea.

“We would of course love to work with other suppliers on a similar collaboration and I’m really interested in showcasing Abu Dhabi or Qatar as an alternative to Dubai.”

Picture L-R: Tricia Sail, Michelle Stammers, Carrie Gibson and Cathie Rowe