Female agent community The Travel Sisterhood hails ‘empowering’ inaugural summit

Female luxury travel agent community The Travel Sisterhood has hailed the success of its “empowering” inaugural summit, held in London on March 16.

The event at Hyatt Regency The Churchill was attended by 26 members and featured an afternoon of content centred around “female-led collaboration”.

The summit included a panel session with guest speakers who shared their insights into a range of topics impacting the luxury travel sector, as well as their career journeys as women in male-dominated fields. 

Panellists included longevity and lifestyle specialist Dr Alka Patel; AI specialist and founder of UK-based strategy and technical consultation company Mireality, Maria Ingold; co-founder of Leicester-based sustainable country estate Keythorpe Hall, Barbara Van Teeffelen; and head of business aviation at global private charter firm Hunt and Palmer. 

The Travel Sisterhood’s ’Inner Circle’ board members – which include Nadine Brady, Limelight Escapes, who founded The Travel Sisterhood; Nat Stacey, Designer Travel; Rebecca Puttock, Wanderlux; Mary Steadman, Lura Lifestyle Management; and Megan McCaffrey-Guerrera, Bella Vita Travels - also hosted a session to share insight into the network’s growth. 

Stacey told Aspire: “The feedback we had from the event was amazing. The whole day was very empowering. We’ll definitely have another one next year.”

She added: “One of the most phenomenal parts of the Sisterhood is that we really celebrate one another’s successes and we’re there to hand hold when someone’s having a bad day. Not everybody works in a big team or has a consortia they can turn to in tricky situations. That is the core of the Sisterhood; we’re there to support one another.”

As membership increases, the ’Inner Circle’ has introduced strict criteria for new applicants, which includes owning a luxury travel business for more than three years, a nomination from a current ‘Sister’ and referrals from reputable suppliers. 

Steadman said: “There are people who have entered the sector who don’t take it seriously as a profession and see it as a side gig. We want to make sure that we’re sharing information with the right people, because we have spent many years of networking to build our contact base and our reputations.”

However, she also recognised the role of the collective in supporting female agents who are growing young businesses. 

“Post-pandemic, a lot of people have entered the travel space who don’t necessarily have the knowledge and the connections,” she said. 

"I think it’s good to nurture them, so we are looking at mentoring and helping people to grow their businesses.”

The Travel Sisterhood also has plans for further international expansion. 

Steadman said: “We’ve grown organically, but it would be great to have ‘Chapters’ in different regions, where eventually someone takes the lead and starts putting the word out there to get members in those areas. We want to make it as global as possible.”