Thousands more cruise specialists to be trained by CLIA via Flight Centre

Flight Centre, co-founded by Graham (‘Skroo’) Turner, opened its first retail store in Sydney in 1982. Today the company has more than 450 stores globally, with around 3,500 employees.

Cruiseabout purchase

As the world’s leading discount flight specialist, Flight Centre made its first venture into the cruise market in 2002 with the purchase of Cruiseabout from Australian pioneer cruise sellers Ross and Denise Blackmore.

The partnership with CLIA encompasses the entire FCTG and independent network across all leisure brands.

‘CLIA is recognised as a world leader in cruise industry training for travel consultants, so we are very pleased to have this opportunity for our travel experts to be trained by the best,’ FCTG Leisure CEO James Kavanagh said.

‘Shop to ship’

‘As more people choose to cruise, it is time for us to upskill our consultants to become specialists so they can offer customers the best ‘shop to ship’ services — from helping them plan their trip to securing the best deal on a cruise that suits,’ Kavanagh said.

‘This agreement enables FCTG leisure brands to aim for a significantly larger market share and aligns with our strategic goal of becoming a major player in the Australian cruise sector.’

Enormous amount of knowledge

CLIA Australasia MD Joel Katz said being part of the CLIA community gives travel consultants access to an enormous amount of knowledge, online training, resources and live events, all of which gives them greater ability to assist their clients and boost their cruise business.

Katz said the agreement with the FCTG will add more than 3,000 travel consultants to CLIA’s global cruise community.