A record number of Virtuoso travel agencies and advisors in Australia and New Zealand have been named as finalists in the 2025 Virtuoso Gala Awards, that will be officially announced in a few weeks time in Las Vegas at Virtuoso Travel Week.The awards are presented at the final night of Virtuoso Travel Week, which runs from Saturday 9 August through Friday 15 August 2025.From Australia and New Zealand, in the ‘Best Agency Culture’ category, there are three finalists from region (among 12 globally), including Spencer Travel Pty Ltd, Tribe Travel Group and Wentworth Travel.In Virtuoso’s ‘Most Admired Advisor’ category, the nominees include Australia’s Mandy Dwyer from Main Beach Travel and Donna Jones, MTA – Mobile Travel Agents. Dwyer and Jones are in a pool of 14 advisors from around the globe vying for the accolade.
Each year at Virtuoso Travel Week, the consortia recognises inspirational travel advisors across seven distinctive fields of luxury travel: Adventure, Culinary, Cruise, Family + Celebration, Sustainability, UltraLuxe and Wellness.The Community Advisor awards recognises a travel advisor who inspires one or more of these types of travel, and demonstrates that through the top level of sales and engagement, with nominees and winners based on agency reported sales data. There are also best Community Partner awards nominees and winners, which are based on voting in the community.This year, Kerry Graham of The Private Travel Company in New Zealand is a finalist in the Top Sustainability Community Advisor field.Additionally, Sonia Jones Travel has been named a Top 3 finalist for Member Agency, Virtuoso Sustainability Awards. This is the second successive year that Sonia Jones Travel has been named a finalist in this field.“Virtuoso Australia and New Zealand is really well represented in these prestigious awards,” Greg Treasure, General Manager of Virtuoso AUNZ told LATTE. “This is the most finalists we’ve had at the Awards, post-pandemic,” Treasure said.This year, Virtuoso Travel Week will include three Connects events, for the first time. The Connects events are operated by Virtuoso in each global region throughout the year. In 2025, Virtuoso sees an opportunity to bring that concept to Las Vegas, on Monday through Wednesday. The Travel Week Connects events will be centred on three areas:
New-to-Network Partners
LGBTQ+ travel experiences, and
Exclusive luxury golf offerings
Keynote speaker
The keynote speaker at the General Session on Sunday afternoon has been confirmed as Will Guidara – an award-winning restaurateur, co-founder of Eleven Madison Park, and author of Unreasonable Hospitality: The Remarkable Power of Giving People More Than They Expect.
AUNZ delegation
Treasure also confirmed that more than 40 Virtuoso travel advisors from this region will be attending the 2025 ‘Fashion Week of Travel’. That number is slightly down on the 2024 number, but Treasure acknowledged that since last year, the number of international visitors to the US in general, from overseas markets, was down.“The delegation is a good spread of new advisors that haven’t been before, which will be exciting for them, along with those that see the value in returning time and time again.”The Australian contingent of Virtuoso travel advisors, along with Virtuoso’s ANZ team, will meet in Las Vegas for a Welcome Session on Sunday ahead of the General Session.
New AUNZ Advisory Board member
Treasure revealed a new face to Virtuoso’s Advisory Board following the completion of tenures by past members. In New Zealand, Kerry Graham of The Private Travel Company was elected as New Zealand Representative on the Australia and New Zealand Member Advisory Board, succeeding Leith Sission from North Shore Business Travel.Danny Engleman of FBI Travel was re-elected as Advisory Board member for the Air Committee for a further term.Graham’s election to the Advisory Board will ‘officially’ take effect at Virtuoso Travel Week.
More ‘matched appointments’
Treasure also confirmed that matched appointments have been cranked up in 2025, with about 40 percent more for members this year than in 2024.That change is in response to members, particularly from long-haul markets like Australia and New Zealand, that use Travel Week as an opportunity to meet with top level executives from partners they sell, or are more likely to sell.This year’s appointment schedule has matched appointments in the morning sessions, and additional matched appointments in the afternoon. Last year, and on a trial basis, the afternoon sessions were less stringent, enabling partners and advisors to connect as they wished, rather than being scheduled.“Our members are going a long way to get to Las Vegas, and the priority is trying to get to people you know.”“Members want to try jam pack as many meetings in as they can, so the ability to have locked in appointments with who you want to get to for the full day is going to be really important,” Treasure told LATTE.
“We’re expecting this year’s Travel Week will be yet another great event.”“The event has evolved from the early days of no matched appointments, to dozens of meetings each day, four-minute networking and people falling over exhausted, to now being far more structured,” Treasure said.
Promotion for Treasure
Meanwhile, Sophie Treasure, Virtuoso AUNZ’s Account Director of Partner Relations for the past two years has been promoted this month to Director Global Partnerships – AUNZ, Greater China, North & South East Asia.Her promotion comes as Virtuoso tweaks it undertakes a “global realignment” and scope for partners to be managed by the partner team in the region of the property, rather than from the United States.Treasure’s focus on this burgeoning region comes ahead of a new Virtuoso role that will be Singapore based, LATTE can also reveal.
