The Founder of Italian tour operator Meet & Greet Italy has spent the past week in Australia, meeting with existing, new and potential partners and travel advisors around the country.
With a long personal and family history in travel and tourism, Edmondo Boscoscuro, CEO of Meet & Greet Italy launched his specialist rail touring business in 2015, and while the pandemic may have slowed business growth, he is looking to 2024 and beyond for the travel rebound.
Speaking with LATTE this week, Boscoscuro said the pandemic was a great leveler for his business and took the opportunity to rethink his business model, with an increased focus on being a sustainable company.
Meet & Greet Italy offers two primary services; small group (up to 26) tours by train and independent tours by train. Relying on Italy’s Trenitalia railway service for getting his guests to and from their destinations, means the business has a very low carbon footprint in terms of transportation.
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Acting like a destination management company, Meet & Greet Italy provides six multi-day tour packages for English-speaking markets. The curated and escorted itineraries utilise public trains, offering guaranteed departures with select inclusions, staying in four-star hotels.
One of the benefits of rail travel, according to Boscoscuro, is the central location of the train stations in Italian cities. Meet & Greet Italy’s service also includes a luggage service whereby the guests leave their luggage in their hotel room when they check out, and by the time they arrive at their next hotel later that day, their bags are ‘magically’ awaiting them. This is achieved by enabling clients to begin their city sightseeing and explorations from the moment they arrive at their next station, without the hassle and stress of dragging their luggage around to their hotel. It’s a seamless service that offers increased freedom for the guest. Boscoscuro tells LATTE this simple convenience equates to half a day of extra sightseeing on a seven-day itinerary.
The company’s flagship product is its tailormade packages, enabling travel advisors to upgrade hotels to five-star and luxury options, which are processed via Meet & Greet Italy’s bespoke quotation platform named Luca.
Launched just three month ago, Boscoscuro says Luca is designed to assist travel professionals seeking custom quotations that “need a human touch”.
Luca’s technology enables Meet & Greet Italy to streamline its process when building packages, with quotes produced within 24 hours.
The core ‘Classic’ itinerary offered by Meet & Greet Italy is an 11-day journey starting from Milan and heading south to Venice, Florence, Rome and Sorrento, with a range of tours enroute. Shorter duration trips are offered starting further into the same itinerary, along with a unique 9-day Northern Lakes trip from Lake Maggiore to Venice that visits Stresa, Locarno, Como and Verona.
Trips are also purposely designed so they can be booked back-to-back, or as a pre-tour experience to a cruise departing from Venice or neighbouring ports.
In the coming weeks, Meet & Greet Italy will also launch what Boscoscuro says will be a travel industry first. Set to commence operation in 2024, will be a 7-night rail tour of Sicily that will use brand-new trains, travelling from Letojanni to Palermo, visiting Taormina, Mt Etna, Modica and more. Sicily’s Treasures will be bookable in the next few weeks.
Another new train tour experience that is likely to be of interest to Australian travellers will be culinary-focused. The yet-to-be-named tour – that’s how new it is! – will comprise two nights each in Rome, Naples, Florence and Taormina. The food and wine itinerary will unlock pasta in Rome, pizza in Naples (lemincello along the Amalfi Coast), meat and wine in Florence, parmesan, balsamic and ham in Moderna and chocolates in Taormina.
This trip will include cooking classes and will be escorted by a sommelier.
“It will be a full experience in Italian food,” Boscoscuro declared.
For more information, see meetandgreetitaly.com and to access the travel advisor page, go to meetandgreetitaly.com/agenthub/.
Lead image: Pictured in Chatswood this week are Meet & Greet Italy’s Edmondo Boscoscuro, CEO and Vera Pajovic, Marketing & Business Development, Australia.