Acquisition

TourMaG – With Shanti Travel, Tierra Latina and Amérigo, your group now covers a substantial portion of the world. How is this ensemble organized?

Jérémy Grasset : Indeed, Shanti Travel mainly focuses on Asia. We have a presence in Japan, Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Singapore.

Tierra Latina specializes in Latin America. We also maintain offices in Brazil and Argentina, as well as a Mexico City office under the Mexikoo brand.

With Amérigo, we added North America: the United States and Canada. This brings geographic complementarities. Amérigo is also active in Latin America, which also helps generate volume for our receptive activities.

TourMaG – Why did you decide to acquire Amérigo?

Jérémy Grasset: Jean Eustache (founder of Amérigo ndlr) approached me last year and suggested that we explore a discussion. We quickly realized that our activities complemented one another, particularly in terms of geography.

There was also a solid opportunity to launch Asia within Amérigo as a tour operator, for both group services and GIRs. We had GIR productions that were not widely distributed until now. Thanks to Amérigo, they are now more widely shared.

Amérigo is indeed registered as a tour operator and is listed with around 3,000 agencies in France.

In a second phase, we also plan to restart a bespoke service for Asia. But for the moment, we must take the time to integrate.

TourMaG – This acquisition strengthens your presence in the French B2B market…

Jérémy Grasset : Exactly. We were already recognized in the French B2B market, but quantifying it was challenging. And, achieving visibility is tougher for receptive operators.

The fact of having acquired Amérigo has reinforced our B2B image in the market. It now allows us to attract more groups and more B2B clients.

TourMaG – Some groups in the tour-operating business acquire receptive firms. This time, a receptive is acquiring a tour operator. How do you view this complementarity between the two lines of business?

Jérémy Grasset : Those who know the sector understand the difference between the two trades, but today, a French tour operator that produces everything in-house, purchases its rooms from a database and offers bespoke experiences is almost a receptive.

Direct production by tour operators is increasing, especially in countries where labor costs are high. In the United States or Canada, for instance, it is difficult to offer bespoke arrangements with a receptive behind it: there aren’t many that still do that. Receptives in developed countries mainly handle groups or GIRs.

It makes sense that this complementarity exists and that tour operators acquire receptive firms. Indeed, we have a receptive firm that is taking over a tour operator.

TourMaG – Amérigo will be able to rely on your receptive networks, but can it also collaborate with receptive operators that are competitors?

Jérémy Grasset : We aim to preserve this complementarity between the different units while maintaining a certain autonomy. Within our group, internal competition between units and competition with external rivals can coexist in a healthy way.

In travel, we often speak of partners rather than mere competitors. You can be competitive with your partners and partner with your competitors. Crises tend to strengthen collaboration across the different disciplines.

What matters is that the traveler experiences a wonderful journey, fulfills their dreams, and that the trip is executed flawlessly.

TourMaG – What brought you closer to Amérigo?

Jérémy Grasset : At Amérigo, there was a culture of receptive business, since, for years, Jean (Eustache ndlr) built receptive networks and represented LatAm and North America. He knows the trade very well.

In the final months of collaboration, we realized we spoke the same language. We are two product-oriented companies with excellent field knowledge. Amérigo’s teams possess a very good understanding of their destinations.

This, I believe, is the strength of the group today: in each entity, we have seasoned destination experts.

TourMaG – Asia, Americas… Are you targeting other geographic zones such as Oceania or Africa?

Jérémy Grasset : Being a specialist in a single region is no longer feasible nowadays. There are many geopolitical surprises, so we must continue diversifying risks as well as clientele sources.

The United States, despite some difficulties, remains an attractive destination for us. The day when Asia or Japan falters, and political shifts occur, we know the United States will rebound.

Oceania, we have begun selling on our site for our receptive activities. Once we have a traveler, it is, of course, interesting to offer another destination. In B2B as well, it works well.

Africa, why not, but for now it is not in the current projects.

Diversification also concerns client sources. Shanti is a hybrid, multichannel group, which should enable us to adapt to evolving markets and to become more agile.

We do not know exactly what will work tomorrow. Today there is the AI revolution, but also a return to agencies for high-quality luxury bespoke travel. We observe several trends in parallel, and it is hard to predict which will prevail.

That is why we are expanding in this manner, notably to secure activity.

TourMaG – Have you created synergies between the different teams?

Jérémy Grasset : We have always invested heavily in training, both for destinations and for sales techniques and tools.

We are now more focused on destination training. The advantage is that Amérigo, like Shanti, shares a true culture of effective IT tools. We find ourselves aligned with these approaches.

The teams have learned to know each other and to meet. These are fields that can be somewhat different, but we try to figure out together how things work.

There are also recruitments underway. For Asia, we are seeking major destination specialists. This allows us to rely on former Shanti travel experts who moved back to France for personal reasons, and whom we are bringing back into Amérigo, for example.

TourMaG – How much does the group weigh today?

Jérémy Grasset : The group currently amounts to 35 million euros.

TourMaG – What are your next priorities?

Jérémy Grasset : For now, we are in a phase of deepening the destinations we already cover. There will be new developments later, but it is too soon to discuss them.

Today, the objective is to consolidate the whole. We must, if you will, “digest the acquisition,” integrate the new elements and train the teams.