Grand Prix Grand Tours starts selling through trade

Grand Prix Grand Tours has struck an agreement to supply Hays Travel as the Formula One specialist bids to start selling through the trade.

The London-based operator, founded in 2016, began supplying Hays Travel in late July and now plans to reach more agency groups.

“We always wanted to develop the B2B side,” said Grand Prix Grand Tours director and co-founder Jay Chauhan, adding: “There are a lot of bookings to be made through the agent network.”

The operator sells packages to every F1 race apart from the Chinese Grand Prix and also offers packages to half of the MotoGP calendar. It will soon start selling tickets to the 24-hour Le Mans race for the first time.

Sales have been growing every year through the company’s direct-sell website, but Chauhan hopes the newly created trade portal will help build relationships with agents.

“We register them on our B2B portal and that allows them to access the B2B pricing,” he said, adding that the operator would ensure price-parity with direct offers.

The trade portal has been designed to give agents significant flexibility when creating quotes, enabling them to take into account specific client requests.

“We try to make the process as efficient as possible for the agent,” said Chauhan, adding: “A lot of the conversation happens between the agent and the client before they come to us to finalise the booking.”

The company has grown to become a 12-strong team across sales, operations, marketing and IT, with every employee described as a motorsport fan.

“We’re now a better structured team for growth, so taking on the agent market is a good thing for us to do right now,” said Chauhan.

He added that he would start considering future agency partnerships in the next two to four weeks.