WTM Award to GRNConnect

GRNConnect has won the prestigious TRAVTALK -WTM World Travel Leaders Award for having a positive impact on the tourism and hospitality industry in India. Deepak Narula, Managing Director, GRNConnect, shares details about the company’s future readiness during such unprecedented times.

Nisha Verma

GRNConnect bagged the TRAVTALK – WTM World Travel Leaders Award at a virtual ceremony during WTM Virtual. An exhilarated Deepak Narula said, “Our business ground to a halt at the peak of the pandemic and we quickly started to rebuild our business for the future by identifying areas where we could make a difference to our suppliers and partners.”

Talking about challenges the industry is facing today and how they coped with the situation, Narula said, “We took some initiatives to be future-ready. We started focusing on technology and products, whether it was on the supply side; or UI, UX etc.; or optimisation —we started working on it and the team supported a lot. One particular decision that went in our favour was that instead of suspending the entire sales team, we shifted their focus on international markets. We identified around 100 markets globally and started focusing on those. We appointed exclusive partners in most of these markets, and are still in the process of appointing more agents. Out of these 100, we have exclusive partners in about 70-80 countries.”

Sharing that the future of travel agents is bright, he said, “Retail travel and the future of retail travel agents is very promising in India. All they have to do is to embrace technology. Also, they have to make it a one-stop shop.” Narula also believes in giving back to society. “We continuously fund and support underprivileged girls from Delhi to work with us for a short period and get them jobs as well,” informed Narula. Talking about the future, he said that he is positive about 2021.