The history of TUI Netherlands dates back to 1876, when Jacobus Lisonne organized a group trip to London. With a partner, he started Lisonne & Lindeman, the basis of what later became Holland International. At the end of the 1990s, like Arke, it came into the hands of German TUI, a name that has now been known in Holland as a travel brand for ten years. Anno 2025, there is no travel organization with such a long history in Europe. Kers is proud: "We have always been a forerunner. We will therefore certainly dwell on our one hundred and fifty-year anniversary. I like to emphasize that we have that history, as a company and as an industry.
Revolution
Meanwhile, according to Kers, TUI Netherlands is also a paragon of the growth of e-commerce, with online annual sales of more than 800 million euros. 'People sometimes ask: "You're from that travel agency, aren't you?" No, we are a travel agency, with 140 travel agencies and all kinds of other channels. We are a top five player in Dutch e-commerce, the largest in travel, omnichannel driven, vertically organized.'
According to Kers, TUI Netherlands and Belgium, for which he is also responsible as Managing Director, are in the midst of a period of transformation. The rise of the Internet as a booking channel is already shaking up the industry considerably. Kers: "I think the AI revolution will bring about even more. AI is an enabler of acceleration and flexibility, everyone will have to go along with it. Within TUI Netherlands, we have already developed some great examples with external partners, from which the organizations in our sister markets are also learning. I'm going to talk about that at the Webwinkel Vakdagen.
"We are a top 5 player in Dutch e-commerce, the largest in travel, omnichannel driven, vertically organized."
- Arjan Kers
Lisa and Lena
Can Kers give a sneak peek? "For starters, AI plays a big role in our contact centers. Thanks to advanced translation capabilities, we can easily serve Dutch customers from Egypt, for example. Among other things, we work with Copilot, for which we have built our own base. In addition, we use a lot of AI for every conceivable scheduling task, for example for crew assignment in our airplanes. Nice to mention is Lena, our award-winning AI influencer.
Of course there are people who find this impersonal, but it's also incredibly more efficient, because Lena doesn't have to fly anywhere and can visit an infinite number of destinations. Look, our business is and always will be people business - that's also the fun part - but technology adds efficiency and unburdening. The same goes for our app, for example.'
In addition to Lena, TUI Netherlands recently introduced Lisa, an AI-powered travel consultant. She appears as an avatar on a large touchscreen in travel agencies. A concierge service, Kers calls it: 'Lisa does the first intake with the customer, for example when the travel agent is busy with another customer. Will we extend Lisa to online as well? That could well be in a year or two, if she can give very good tailored answers. It is still sometimes too standard now; we are still testing, processing and constantly improving her conversations.'
At the table with major parties
With nearly 30 years of experience at TUI, Kers knows better than anyone how dependent the travel industry is on external factors such as geopolitical and economic developments, but also, for example, pandemics, hurricanes, bankruptcies and flight shaming. 'This industry is super-energetic and flexible. Great strides have already been made in the area of sustainability and, as TUI, we will certainly continue to do so. As long as we remain healthy as a company, we can continue to be sustainable.'
Beneath the fluctuations in demand is a continuous upward trend, Kers sees: 'People will travel more and more. With new technology we are trying to respond to that as efficiently as possible. We have been working together with Google for some time, but nowadays we are also sitting around the table with various other large international parties, for example to jointly test novelties in the field of AI. Super interesting.
The digital developments have a major impact on the organization, continues the travel entrepreneur: 'Where we used to recruit people mainly from tourism courses, they now also come from TU Delft. Econometricians, data analysts, product owners, the profiles have changed a lot.
"Our business is and remains a people business."
- Arjan Kers
The future of the travel agency
Kers sees not only that people are booking more and more trips, but also that they are going back to the brick-and-mortar travel agency more often. "After the uncertain corona period, there has been a reset. Of course customers can do a lot themselves at home, but for complicated and more expensive trips they would like to speak to someone. The value of our staff is great: they know the differences between destinations, they are a familiar face and they take care of their concerns. Research shows that people spend 40 hours a year taking vacations online.' An employee can give direction based on experience, Kers means, helped by technology: 'You see more and more digitalization within our 140 stores, through different tools and solutions like Lisa.
They are becoming concept stores, where customers like to come. The future of the travel agency is not only in selling vacations, but also in providing service and taking people into the experience.' Online reinforces offline and vice versa, according to Kers: 'So we are not looking at individual channels, but at end-to-end profitability.'
Ecosystem
Services around vacations are an important growth driver for TUI. Kers: 'We achieve the high volumes with complete vacations, our flights and our hotels, but upselling is the revenue model towards the future. From seats to hand luggage and from transfers to hotel services. The advantage is that we control all that ourselves, so we can guarantee quality and easily make adjustments in the customer journey.'
To serve customers even more broadly, TUI has developed the Global Curated Leisure Marketplace , to which other providers in the travel industry can connect. From safaris to single flights with other airlines, and from car rentals to concert tickets. 'We are building one TUI ecosystem, where people don't have to leave anymore. They can come to us all year round, including for a weekend getaway, for example. We want to make a difference as a platform. The combination of our vast experience in travel, the wide product range and the use of technology makes us futureproof, where we continue to focus on service, quality and reliability.' The platformization is also related to AI, concludes Kers: 'We do everything we can to be the winner when someone enters a prompt. Then that customer can come to us for all their travel needs.'
Arjan Kers will give a keynote presentation at Webwinkel Vakdagen on Wednesday, March 25, at 2:30 pm. He will do so together with his colleague Suzanne Goossen, Director Sales & Marketing at TUI Netherlands and TUI Belgium.
