Tui River Cruises has started working with 200 new travel agencies this year, with bookings through the trade now accounting for 16% of sales.
The operator said trade sales had increased by 6% this year on the back of increased capacity and also reported a “massive increase” in engagement with its online training programme in the same period.
Tui River Cruises currently has a fleet of five adult-only river cruise vessels, with its newest Nile ship, Tui Al Horeya, in its first month of sailing.
The river cruise operator is due to launch another Nile ship, Tui Bahareya, in November 2025, and Tui Ria in Europe in April 2026.
Katy Berzins, head of Tui River Cruises, said the line had made significant investment in trade relations, including offering its first agent incentive.
She also said investment in “a lot of internal resource” had helped drive growth, adding: “We’re taking a really good share in terms of volumes, and trade volumes have grown by 6% because of the increased capacity.
“This is just the start of what we could look like for the trade.”
The river cruise operator has been growing incrementally since launching three years ago, said Berzins, with the proportion of bookings via the trade remaining “relatively similar” year on year.
“There’s still a lot more we can do in the trade with regard to new partnerships, and the key thing is spending a lot more quality time [with agents] and getting people seeing the ships,” she said.
Focuses for next year include offering more shorter-duration journeys to encourage new-to-river customers and greater flexibility around cruise-and-stay and back-to-back cruise options, in addition to the creation of a more diverse excursions programme to appeal to different demographics.
Berzins hinted at “lots of exciting things in the pipeline” and said she was hopeful of continued growth as the fleet expands to six ships in 2025 and seven in 2026.
She added: “It’s a lot to do, but hopefully this time next year we will be talking about increased demand and further growth.”