APT is getting BIGGER and BIGGER
PHOTO LEFT: Emma Coburn of APT receiving Best River Cruise Line Award from John Pond at the recent Cruise Passenger Magazine Awards Night.
Due to the company’s success and growth APT is moving its 201 Hampton Street staff to the third and fourth floors at 1230 Nepean Highway, Cheltenham, 7 kilometres away. Management,
reservations, product, accounts and marketing personnel for the APT Group (including Travelmarvel and Botanica) will be located there.
APT CEO, Chris Hall said APT was reluctant to move from the Hampton business community but there was no additional space available and there were obvious business inefficiencies in having staff in three different buildings along Hampton Street. “We were bursting at the seams,” he said. “We have a very solid business platform and we have enjoyed
consistent growth over the last 10 years, even accounting for the recent GFCrisis, and we need new space for the strategic development of the company.”
APT resisted the temptation to move to the CBD, or to an inner suburban office because of the company’s history there and the fact that most staff had been drawn from the local area over many years, Mr Hall said.
When APT moved into Hampton Street 35 years ago, it had about 25 staff.
One of Australia’s largest travel companies, APT operates cruises and touring in Canada/Alaska, luxury river cruising and touring in Europe, Russia, China and Vietnam-Cambodia, luxury rail in Russia, international and local garden tours, coach touring in New Zealand and Australia, small group 4WD adventures in Outback Australia and inbound language special tours.
Mr Hall said that while “extraordinary” demand for the company’s luxury river cruising product over the last five years was fuelling growth, he attributed the overall growth to the business partnerships APT had created, and nurtured, with specialist operators, such as European river ship designers AMAWATERWAYS, Indo China river cruise operators – Indochina Sails, the garden touring expert Judy Vanrennen, the Aboriginal communities in northern Australia and the Conway family at Kings Canyon.
“We’ve built our own river ships, we’ve built our own wilderness lodges and we’ve built our own small group 4WD vehicles so we have made a significant investment in infrastructure,” he said.
“Through these partnerships and that investment we have created control over our product which ultimately delivers consistently high quality holiday experiences to our customers and trust through the agency networks,” he said.
I love River Ship Cruising,
John.
John Pond facebook
