PHOENIX — The clock strikes 10:16 a.m. and the room buzzes with handshakes, introductions and the swapping of business cards.
At the JW Marriott Phoenix Desert Ridge Resort & Spa here, the inaugural GTM Luxury, hosted by Northstar Travel Group (Travel Weekly’s parent company), with its speed-dating-style approach to meetings between travel advisors and suppliers, is in full swing. The minutes fly by, but it’s enough time to form relationships.
GTM Luxury is the newest rendition of Northstar’s invitation-only Global Travel Marketplace events. To be selected to attend, advisors must sell at least $1 million annually to clients who spend a minimum of $1,000 per person, per day; have at least two years of experience selling luxury travel; and have a roster of high-net-worth clients.
At her table at the JW Marriott’s conference center, Kristen Buckshire, who owns Travel Ease and is based in Augusta, Ga., has 52 appointments over two days with luxury-focused suppliers. Buckshire, who specializes in luxury family travel, is meeting with brands like Rental Escapes, Crystal and Scenic Luxury Cruises.
While meeting with Arts & Leisure Tours, Buckshire tells the tour operator it may be a match for a client who wants to plan a multigenerational trip to Grand Cayman.
“It seems like they have a good pulse on the luxury experience,” Buckshire later says of Arts & Leisure, adding that she didn’t currently have a good supplier for custom Caribbean trips.
Kristen and Justin Buckshire of Travel Ease and Margaret’s Travel at GTM Luxury in Phoenix. Photo Credit: Brinley Hineman
She has a similar reaction to Titanium Tours, a luxury DMC for Spain, Portugal, France and Switzerland. While still at GTM, she has already texted clients about the brand.
Buckshire, who is on track to sell $5 million to $6 million in travel this year between Travel Ease and the recently acquired Margaret’s Travel, has attended other GTM events but was drawn to the luxury-focused version to meet suppliers who understand the experience her clients crave.
“They need something very curated — very high-end — to feel like they are getting that experience and leaving their kids with that legacy of travel,” she says.
In searching for suppliers, Buckshire says she and her husband, Justin, who left his corporate job to oversee Margaret’s Travel, are on the hunt for “authenticity”: suppliers with unique experiences that can’t be replicated.
GTM Luxury was created to meet the soaring luxury travel demand, said Alicia Evanko-Lewis, executive vice president of events for Northstar.
And more are planned: The next GTM Luxury will be in January in Los Angeles, and GTM Luxury APAC is on tap in Singapore in April.
Travel advisor Jami Turner of The Travel Fanatic, left, poses with Robin and Stella Mountain of Ntaba African Safaris. Photo Credit: Brinley Hineman
A match made at GTM
Immediately after Stella and Robin Mountain of Ntaba African Safaris, a tour operator, sit down at Jami Turner’s table, the advisor asks: “Next safari, what are we doing?”
Turner, the owner of The Travel Fanatic in Odessa, Texas, is using one of her six-minute appointments to begin brainstorming a 2028 safari with the Mountains, with whom she connected at a previous GTM and sent a group on safari with earlier this year. Turner, who is set to do $2 million in sales this year, mostly in group travel, says planning a group safari trip was a leap of faith, but she feels confident in the operator since it was vetted by the GTM team.
Typically, Turner won’t bring a group back to a destination for at least five years after they’ve visited, but she’s breaking the rule for Ntaba African Safaris.
“It was that amazing,” she says of the safari. “GTM works.”
