Second Peaks Is Coming. If You Want a Piece of It, You Need to Start Now

The travel industry has two peaks. Most people only know about one.

Ask anyone outside the trade when holidays get booked and they will say January. They are not wrong. The first full week of January is the biggest booking window in the calendar and the whole industry gears up for it.

But there is a second one. It runs through September and into October, and it is one of the best kept secrets in the business.

We call it second peaks. And it starts in a matter of weeks.

What is second peaks?

Second peaks is the surge of bookings that lands the moment the schools go back.

The summer season is done. Families have just come home from two weeks in the sun. The suitcases are still in the hallway and the tan is fading fast. And that is exactly when people start thinking about the next one.

Three things happen at once.

People book next summer early. Customers who have just had a great holiday want to lock in the same thing for next year. Early booking offers from the big operators are live, deposits are low, and the best rooms in the best resorts are still available. Customers know it and they act on it.

Winter sun and Christmas trips get booked. Canaries, Egypt, Caribbean, Lapland, Christmas markets, New York in December. The winter programme is short lead time and it all sells in the autumn.

Ski goes on sale properly. The ski market moves fast in September and October and there is real commission sitting in it.

Add it up and you get a market buying across three seasons in the same eight week window.

Here is the problem with waiting

Second peaks is not a month you can turn up to. It is a month you have to be ready for.

If you sign up in September you will spend the whole surge in training. Learning the systems. Getting your supplier logins set up. Working out how to load a booking. All perfectly normal, all part of the process, and all happening while the busiest autumn window in travel goes by without you.

The agents who do well out of second peaks are the ones who were already trading when it started.

That is why the decision point is now, not September. Start today and you will have your training completed, your suppliers live, your CRM working and your first enquiries coming in before the schools go back. You get to spend September selling instead of studying.

What starting now actually looks like

• Week one: application, discovery call and onboarding • Week two: core training and system access • Week three: full setup, first quotes, first bookings

The point to hammer is that the runway is short but it is not zero. Someone starting this week is trading by the time the schools go back. Someone starting in mid September is not.

Why homeworking is the right model for this

The traditional route into travel meant a high street shop, fixed hours and someone else keeping the commission.

Working as a homeworking travel agent flips that. You set your own hours, you work around school runs and other commitments, and you keep a far bigger share of what you earn. You are running your own business, not covering someone else's rota.

What you do not want is to do it alone. That is where a travel franchise makes the difference. You get the ABTA and ATOL protected trading, the supplier rates, the booking systems, the marketing support and the compliance framework already built. All you have to bring is the customers and the graft.

And then January takes care of itself

There is a second prize here worth mentioning.

January is a brilliant month to be a travel agent. It is a very hard month to be a brand new one. Learning the job while the phone is ringing is not where you want to be.

Get started now, trade through second peaks, and by the time the New Year rush arrives you will have four months of real bookings behind you, a customer base already built and repeat enquiries coming back to you. You get to enjoy peaks instead of surviving it.

Do not watch this one go past

Second peaks does not wait for anyone. The bookings will be made in September whether you are trading or not. The only question is who takes the commission.

If you have been sitting on the idea of starting your own travel business, the window to be ready is open right now and it closes when the schools go back.