Top 10 Most Powerful Travel Agencies
Travel is still navigating a new normal amid the COVID-19 pandemic but, nonetheless, 2019 was another remarkable year for the industry as evidenced by the 2021 Travel Weekly Power List, which ranks companies with $100 million or more in travel sales in the previous calendar year.
Here are the 10 agencies that fared the best.
1. Expedia
Expedia Group, which owns Hotels.com, Vrbo, Trivago, Orbitz, Travelocity and Hotwire, among a plethora of other brands, reported $107.9 billion in sales last year. More than 40 percent of transactions across the group's consumer OTA brands were booked via mobile, with total app transactions jumping more than 40 percent year over year.
2. Booking Holdings
Reporting $96.4 billion in gross travel bookings in 2019, Booking Holdings remains number two on the Power List for 2020. The publicly-held company's subsidiaries include Booking.com, Kayak, OpenTable, Priceline.com, Agoda and Rentalcars.com.
3. American Express Global Business Travel
American Express Global Business Travel refused to rest on its laurels in 2019, further elevating its business and appointing Paul Abbott CEO en route to $42.6 billion in sales, which is good enough for third on Travel Weekly's 2020 Power List.
4. BCD Travel
BCD Travel, which provides travel management services in as many as 109 countries, checks in at number four on the 2020 Power List after reporting $27.5 billion in sales last year.
5. CWT
CWT, rebranded from Carlson Wagonlit Travel, remains in the top five for 2020 with sales nearing $25 billion last year. Founded nearly three decades ago, the business-to-business travel management platform offers business travel, technology and meetings and events management across six continents.
6. Flight Centre Travel Group (USA)
2019 was a banner year for Flight Centre Travel Group USA, which saw corporate sales increase 30 percent over 2018. Boasting $16 billion in sales last year, the successful agency works with nearly 20,800 hosted agents who were responsible for $56 million in sales.
7. Internova Travel Group
Internova Travel Group, formerly Travel Leaders Group, ranks seventh again in 2020 with nearly $7.5 billion in sales last year, $3.9 billion of which was generated by the group's 10,000 hosted agents.
8. American Express Travel
American Express Travel also stayed put on the 2020 Power List, coming in eighth place with 2019 sales nearing $7 billion. Last year was a busy one for the company, which raised air and lodging program value and implemented new booking options for card members as well as acquired a pair of digital platforms in LoungeBuddy and Resy.
9. Direct Travel
2019 was a big year for leading travel management company Direct Travel, which posted $5.8 billion in sales and acquired more than a half-dozen companies, including Professional Travel, which ranked 31st on Travel Weekly's 2019 Power List with $404.8 million in sales.
10. Fareportal
New York City-based Fareportal jumps into the top 10 with $5.34 billion in sales in 2019. A vast majority of the company's sales (93 percent) came from leisure travel.