Two former holiday reps with backgrounds in corporate HR and the travel industry joined The Travel Franchise in December 2023 with a shared passion for travel and no experience of running their own agency. Within seven months they had hit the Money-Back Challenge and received their entire £14,995 franchise fee back in full. Two years on they have a growing team, a new office and a six-figure Peaks season behind them.

Dean and Simon had been giving away free travel advice for years before they decided to do something about it. Between them they had decades of knowledge, a network of friends and family who trusted their recommendations and a growing realisation that all of that expertise was going out the door without a penny coming back.

Dean spent twenty years working in the travel industry in various roles, starting as a holiday rep overseas before moving into management and UK airports. Simon spent nearly three decades in corporate HR, commuting into London and spending his best hours on a career that had long since stopped exciting him. They had both worked as reps in 2002, which is how they met, and travel had been a central part of both their lives ever since.

The question of why they were not getting paid for the advice they gave away freely became harder and harder to ignore. In December 2023 they joined The Travel Franchise, the award-winning franchise business behind Not Just Travel, the consumer-facing brand under which all consultants trade.

“It sort of came to the point where we thought, well, actually, why don’t we do that? And then we can cash in on that rather than giving away this free advice.” – Dean

The Money-Back Challenge: hit in seven months

Dean and Simon paid the Elite franchise fee in full from day one specifically to qualify for the Money-Back Challenge, a unique offer exclusive to The Travel Franchise that allows Elite franchisees to earn back their entire £14,995 investment if they reach a set commission level within their first twelve months. No other travel franchise in the UK offers anything comparable.

They tracked their progress weekly, keeping a running total of where they were against the target and adjusting their approach as their confidence and client base grew. Seven months after joining, they had achieved it.

“There was no way we were never going to not hit that. We were determined we were going to do it. Don’t get me wrong, we had times where we were like, God, this is tough. But then we got there and we had time to spare.” – Simon

The retreats that changed everything

Three or four months into the business, Dean and Simon attended the Millionaire’s Retreat in Fuerteventura, their first real immersion in the Not Just Travel community and an early injection of the coaching and guidance that the retreats are designed to provide. The Elite Experience in Mauritius followed later, where they experienced seven hotels first-hand in partnership with Beachcomber, one of the company’s key supplier partners.

Both the Millionaire’s Retreat and the Elite Experience are included as standard in the Elite package at no extra cost. They are not perks or rewards for top performers but a deliberate and integral part of how The Travel Franchise develops its consultants, designed to give them the environment, the coaching and the peer community they need to move their businesses forward.

“Even though we all think we know what we’re doing, we just revisit things that we may have let slip where you get busy on certain things, especially in peaks. And it just reminds you.” – Dean

Dean and Simon have since attended two Seminars at Sea, the cruise-based training events run for Not Just Travel consultants. After the first, on Virgin Voyages, they returned and sold eight Virgin cruises. After the second, on Fred Olsen, they built a Fred client base alongside their Virgin business. The impact of first-hand product knowledge on their sales has been direct and measurable.

Why their clients keep coming back

The demand for personal travel consultants is growing, driven by a public increasingly aware of what they give up when they book alone. Dean and Simon are a compelling example of what that personal service actually looks like in practice.

When a client travels, Dean tracks their flight in real time and messages them with departure updates if there are delays. He checks in when they arrive at the hotel. Boarding passes are sent electronically or posted for clients who prefer it. When clients return home they receive a welcome back card alongside a small pack of tea, coffee and milk, the kind of thoughtful detail that gets shared on social media and consistently sends new enquiries their way.

When things go wrong, their approach is the same. A client once sent Dean a photograph of a collapsed hotel room ceiling within moments of receiving his check-in message. He asked her to go to breakfast, called the hotel and had everything sorted within an hour. She has booked with them every year since.

“Things can go wrong, that’s life. But it’s about facing into them and helping. It can actually work in your advantage because you show your worth even more. And if you look after that customer in the right way, they absolutely come back to you.” – Simon

Their biggest single booking to date was a business class trip to Australia for a family of four with stops in Singapore and Hong Kong, worth £37,000. It did not come from an advertisement. It came from a relationship built on trust, one booking at a time.

Two years in, still learning, still growing

During their most recent Peaks season Dean and Simon completed a month with 37 bookings and just under £120,000 in holiday sales. They have a growing team, a new office and a business that feels, as Dean puts it, like a real business conversation without even realising it.

“You become strategic without even realising it. Because it’s our business. So of course we’re going to do well.” – Dean

Dean and Simon joined The Travel Franchise with no experience of running a travel agency and a passion for travel they had been giving away for free for years. What has changed is not their knowledge or their enthusiasm. What has changed is that they now have the right structure, the right support and the right model to make it worth something.

About The Travel Franchise

The Travel Franchise is the UK’s number one franchise for people new to travel, operating under the consumer-facing brand Not Just Travel. Established in 2001 and with over twenty years in the market, it has helped hundreds of people build successful home-based travel businesses, the vast majority joining with no prior travel industry experience.

The business was voted Best Lifestyle Franchise in the World for two consecutive years, 2025 and 2026, at the International Franchise Association’s Global Franchise Awards. It has also been named Britain’s Best Home-Based Franchise, Best European Franchise and is ranked in the top ten of all UK franchises, the only travel franchise to achieve that standing. Celebrity brand ambassadors include TV broadcaster Eamonn Holmes OBE and double Olympic champion Daley Thompson CBE.

Two packages are available. The Lite Mentorship Programme from the equivalent of £28 a week for a gradual, part-time start with an experienced mentor from day one. The Elite package at £14,995 plus VAT, the flagship, including five-day training, a dedicated Business Consultant,

two fully funded overseas mentorship retreats and the unique Money-Back Challenge.