In any elite sales organization there are top qualifiers who are hard to please. But when you’re creating an incentive trip to excite and motivate some of the top travel agents in the country, who cater to wealthy leisure travelers and have high standards of their own, finding the right destination is a process fraught with pitfalls.

That was the challenge facing Virtuoso’s David Hansen, executive vice president of operations and finance, and Muriel Wilson, director of conferences and events. Virtuoso is a luxury travel network with 338 member independent travel agencies in 612 locations throughout North and South America, the Caribbean, and Australia and New Zealand. Virtuoso provides sales, marketing, and training services to its invitation-only agencies, as well as its network of more than 1,000 screened and accredited hospitality providers.

“The Chairman’s Recognition Event is Virtuoso’s recognition of our top member travel agencies across the globe,” says Hansen, who approves the company’s conferences and events. “Each year, we treat them to an extraordinary trip that rewards them for their high engagement level within Virtuoso and for their achievements in selling our preferred suppliers’ products and services.”

In past years, Virtuoso has taken its top 50 agents and their guests to destinations including India and Peru and on a SeaDream Yacht Club cruise to the Caribbean. In 2009, winners were brought to the Gleneagles Hotel in Perthshire, Scotland. Known as the “Palace on the Glens,” and nestled at the foot of the Scottish highlands, it is an hour from both Edinburgh and Glasgow. Although it’s known for its golf—Gleneagles’ four golf courses include the PGA Centenary Course, host of the 2014 Ryder Cup—there is far more to do there than at many other resorts. Its Equestrian School is one of Europe’s best, and its Shooting School, Gun Dog School, off-road driving courses, gillie-led fly-fishing, and British School of Falconry are also highly regarded. And meeting service? It hosted the 2005 G8 summit of world leaders.

Building Relationships
The Chairman’s Recognition Event is a networking event as well as a reward, according to Wilson. “Virtuoso agents are a group that is all about relationships,” she says. “The CEO, the chairman, and the president make it a point to sit and talk with all of them in small groups during the day and together in the evening. They are able to spend quality time with participants during meals, on the golf course, on the off-road driving courses, and on the bus to and from Edinburgh during the day trip for shopping and sightseeing.”

That access was extremely important, says Jim Strong, president and owner of Strong Travel in Dallas, a single-office firm focused on travel for high-end clientele, with annual sales in excess of $30 million. A participant in the 2009 Chairman’s Recognition Event, he says: “It’s an opportunity to get to know the Virtuoso leaders on a personal level as well as on a business level. Being in a small group, you’re able to form one-on-one relationships. Whether it’s on a coach, over a drink, at golf, or while holding a shotgun, you make that connection.”

On the first full day after arrivals, there was a business session that “pulled the group together to work on common goals, to solve issues affecting the industry,” says Valerie Wilson, chairman and CEO of New York-based Valerie Wilson Travel, which works with both corporate and leisure clients in 14 branches across 10 states. As both a qualifier and chairman of the Virtuoso Advisory Board, she says, “It was very much a success. We brought forward new ideas. As a professional travel agent, I have helped plan incentives. You can’t do one without a work component.”

Attendance at the Chairman’s Recognition Event is not a matter of the same agencies winning over and over, says Muriel Wilson, who notes that “the top three to five winners may be same” each year, but the majority of winners change from trip to trip. Qualification is based on sales of Virtuoso’s preferred suppliers’ products and services, but it is not a straight matter of the highest volume or the most money, she adds. One-third is the top producers by total volume, one-third is comprised of individuals who hit personal sales volume goals, and the last third is based on sales growth of Virtuoso products, Valerie Wilson notes.

The Country Manor Life
Arrival day was a Monday, and after attendees were greeted at the airport and given brief jet-lag massages, there was a mix-and-mingle afternoon tea event held in the Barony Rooms, where participants met each other and discussed the activities they signed up for with Gleneagles managers. Examples were on display, such as Harris hawks from the falconry school and Land Rovers from the off-road courses parked outside the windows. That evening, networking over cocktails was followed by a buffet dinner.

Tuesday started with the business session in the Gleneagles Suite, which can hold up to 360 theater-style, and was kicked off by a video from legendary Sean Connery—who lives in that part of Scotland—welcoming the Virtuoso participants. Spouses were invited and many chose to attend, says Victoria Spichale, senior events manager at Gleneagles. After lunch, participants chose from 10 activities, such as fly-fishing lessons in the property’s 10 lochs, taught by ghillies; dog-handling at the resort’s Gun Dog School; a round of golf on Gleneagles’ Queens Course; a tour of nearby Scone Palace—the crowning place of the kings of Scotland since the 9th century—hosted by its current owner, the Countess of Mansfield; and spa treatments in a 20-room ESPA facility, which was created during a 16-million-pound property enhancement two years ago. That evening, participants visited the nearby Glenturret distillery for a tour and gala dinner, with entertainment by a local band, the Red Hot Chili “Pipers,” which was a favorite of Strong, who notes, “They played Queen and other rock on the bagpipes, it was a lot of fun.”

Wednesday was a day trip to Edinburgh, with options including shopping and visits to the royal palaces. One group lunched at Holyrood Palace, while another dined at Edinburgh Castle. In the evening, there was an on-site dinner hosted by five-star hotel association Connoisseurs Scotland’s owners and managers, at which the special guest speaker was the Scottish Minister for Enterprise, Energy, and Tourism, Jim Mather.

Thursday was a day of competition. One large group took on its Scottish hosts in a mini-Ryder Cup tournament at the PGA Centenary Course, which Virtuoso’s Hansen says was the highlight of the trip for him—he and his partner won their match, although the Virtuoso team “ended up on the short end of the score card,” Hansen says. “For the group, the single highlight was probably our final-night gala at Stirling Castle.”

He wasn’t the only attendee who was impressed by the farewell gala. Anne Scully, president of McCabe World Travel in McLean, VA, who sits on the advisory board of Travel + Leisure magazine, says Stirling Castle “was shades of Harry Potter, with that long table in that incredible hall.” Aside from dinner, there was a swordplay demonstration and a show of falcons, hawks, owls, and eagles from the resort’s British School of Falconry. “It was quite amazing,” says Strong. “The tricks they can do—they even had a bald eagle. After dinner, we were escorted by a bagpipe corps with rolling drums.”

The men were wore kilts with clan tartans selected based on their ancestry. The male Virtuoso executives were of a new tartan, which had been designed especially for the company, while all of the women were provided sashes of that tartan, secured by Celtic pins.

“Gleneagles is a real natural for incentives,” says Priscilla Alexander, president of New York-based Protravel International, which has 22 offices around the U.S. and one in London. “I look at it as all-inclusive for activities to satisfy attendees, and each of the things it has is top-of-the-line. The spa is fabulous. If the Ryder Cup chose its golf course, you know it is fabulous.”

Noting that about 70 percent of her business is corporate, Alexander adds, “The meetings capabilities are great—the G8 chose it—and the service is incredible. If I walked away and said to myself, ‘What can they do better?’ I can’t think of anything.” This page is protected by Copyright laws. Do Not Copy