Collette, America’s oldest tour operator, passed another milestone in its 106-year history last week with the promotion of Jaclyn Leibl-Cote from president to CEO. She succeeds her father, Dan Sullivan Jr., who became CEO in 1990, and now will serve as executive chairman. Leibl-Cote is only the fourth person to take the top position since the company was founded in 1918 by Jack Collette. In 1918, the term “CEO” was not used; but Jack Collette was the equivalent for the time, the founder and owner. He ran the company until 1962 when he sold it to Dan Sullivan Sr., the grandfather of Jaclyn Leibl-Cote. She is the first female CEO of the company. Read the rest of this entry »

Sky Bird Travel & Tours, one of the leading airline consolidators in the industry, has announced the appointment of a new Chief Executive Officer (CEO). Effective April 3, 2023, Norm Knowles assumed the role of CEO to lead the company’s future strategies and expansion plans. This announcement has been made by Arvin Shah, Chairman of Sky Bird Travel & Tours. Read the rest of this entry »

At the USTOA Annual Conference and Marketplace in Austin in late November, I had the good fortune of running into Scott Nisbet, the CEO of the Globus Family of Brands.

As head of one of the most global of all tour operators, Scott Nisbet is a good person to talk to for reading what is happening in the global travel industry. The Globus Family of brands includes Globus escorted tours, Cosmos budget priced tours, Monograms independent tour packages, and Avalon Waterways river cruises. It’s about as broad a selection of travel products as is offered by any company anywhere. Based in Lugano, Switzerland, the company’s reach spreads around the world and touches every aspect of the travel business that is part of a tour, and that’s practically everything. The company offers programs on six continents and sixty-five countries.