Trade-only bed bank Bedswithease is poised to announce new commercial deals with travel agency consortia as part of an ambitious three-year expansion plan.
The bed bank has revealed plans to grow its business by 20% this year compared to 2016 as it reported January 11 was its best trading day in its 15 year history this month.
Sales in early January were more than 25% up year-on-year, with bookings particularly strong for the Greek Islands, mainland Spain, Balearics, Portugal and city breaks.
The bed bank, which currently works with more than 500 agents, is now in talks with consortia including Advantage Travel Partnership and Global Travel Group in a bid to expand its distribution in the UK and Ireland over the next two months.
It is also targeting online travel agents for more business and looking to partner with more bed banks.
Sales director Paul Riches, who joined in November last year, said: “We have ambitious plans over the next three years to expand both our product range and importantly our distribution network in both the UK and Ireland.
“We have historically worked with a small number of UK agents. Now we have a lot more to offer our trade partners and will be doing all we can to increase the number of agents we work with and at the same time grow our business with our existing partners.”
The bed bank also plans to increase its product range in the Canaries, followed by more properties in Portugal. Longer term it aims to broaden its product portfolio in the Caribbean; Dubai; Florida and offer more city product.
The bed bank was set up in 2001, with more than 95% of business coming from the UK market. It has a portfolio of more than 100,000 hotels, of which 20,000 are partner properties and 2,000 are directly contracted.