Travel sector must shift from survival to winning mindset in 2024, says dnata chief

The travel sector must move out of a survival mindset and focus on driving profitability in 2024, according to the chief executive of dnata.

In a panel discussion moderated by Travel Weekly editor-in-chief Lucy Huxley at Abta’s 2023 Travel Convention in Bodrum, Ailsa Pollard said she feels some businesses are still playing the victim card after the Covid pandemic, and urged them to look ahead rather than dwell on the past.

She said she remains confident for trading will remain strong next year despite challenges facing the sector, but warned “we are fooling ourselves if we don’t think there will be disruption or uncertainty”.

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“The sector has to move away from this survival mode and adopt a winning mindset; that’s where the opportunity lies,” said Pollard. “We need to think about how we control the controllables.

“I think there are massive opportunities in 2024, including AI, and people need to make sure they’re focusing on how best adopt it.”

Pollard said companies can shift their mindset by encouraging younger employees to be creative and share their ideas to shape the future vision of the business, in addition to implementing artificial intelligence.

“We’re getting our teams to come up with more ideas and share them with us,” she added. “For example, younger people in our teams have asked why we’re not doing more on TikTok, because people of their age aren’t searching on Google anymore, they’re using TikTok and other social media platforms.

“We’re trying to shift the focus in board meetings so we’re looking at what’s ahead rather than looking at results from last month, because there’s not a lot you can do about that.”

Pollard’s views were echoed by Torey Kings-Hodkin, head of UK and Ireland sales for Royal Caribbean.

She said: “There’s a huge amound of additioanl capacity coming into the [cruise] sector in 2024 and we need to capatlise on that. It needs to be be about profitability [in 2024].

“We are very much on that path and we also want to support our partners to allow them to do the same thing. To do that we’re going to avoid discounting and instead focus on the value of the product and the experience over the price.”

Alistair Rowland, Abta chairman and Blue Bay Travel chief executive, agreed, saying: “Generally, everyone recovered in 2023 and now it’s a case of making decent margins in 2024; investors are laser-focused on that.”