Senior Sales Manager UK & I

Journey with us! Combine your career goals and sense of adventure by joining our exciting team of employees. Royal Caribbean Group is pleased to offer a competitive compensation & benefits package, and excellent career development opportunities, each offering unique ways to explore the world.

About Us

Royal Caribbean Group is the world’s largest cruise line, having a record-breaking year and launching not one but TWO brand new ships in 2025! It couldn’t be a more exciting time to join a global business that is blazing a trail in the travel industry right now.

With our 3 brands Royal Caribbean International, Celebrity Cruises & Silversea we have ships in South America, Europe, Asia, Australia, and several North American markets beyond our headquarters in Miami, FL. We cover the globe. No matter where our guests want to go, Royal Caribbean Group has a ship that can deliver a world-class vacation.

At Royal Caribbean Group we never rest on our laurels; we constantly strive to improve our work and be at the forefront of the industry. The work that we do is exciting, challenging, and innovative. You get to work both independently and as part of a collaborative and dynamic international team. We are passionate, we are innovative, and we are unstoppable.

About the Role

The primary purpose of the role is to ensure that guest, revenue, and average per diem (APD) targets are exceeded across all channels for trade and direct.

Role Overview: 

• Responsible for the management and motivation of 30+ strong sales people with 4 direct reports and the annual sales targets for guests, revenue and overall budgets
• Responsible for the development and implementation of strategic plans ensuring it compliments the distribution strategy.
• Responsible for delivering maximum return on investment across all sales channels and driving cost efficiencies throughout the sales organization.
• Input into the overall development of the total company Annual Operating Plan with proactive input into deployment and identifying ship requirements to match growth opportunities.
• Responsible for new business channels to drive profitable growth (Business Development channels, Commercial Partnerships, Charters & Incentives)Ownership for the overall trade communications, training & engagement strategies to drive the Celebrity Cruises brand forward, ensuring seamless execution throughout all trade channels.
• Management of Trade Marketing, Trade Support, Training, and working closely with PR.
• Ownership for the end-to-end implementation of key event activities for Celebrity Cruises. With key focus on ship visits, ship immersion programs, award ceremonies, internal conferences, new ship launches, along with other ad hoc events.
• Ownership for the strategic planning, project management, creative development, budget management and evaluation of events.
• A key member of the Senior Leadership Team, working alongside their peers and contributing to the future company strategies.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

Distribution Strategy:

• Develop and implement a sales distribution strategy to ensure profitable growth with our trade partners whilst enabling our direct channel to increase share.
• Ensure we have robust annual sales, training and marketing plans and training plans for key partners.
• Utilizing and understanding partner and consumer insight and translating trend dynamics and identifying opportunities.
• Lead commercial negotiations to enable long term growth whilst being conscious of the competitive environment.

Financial Responsibilities:

• Working alongside the Director of Commercial FP&A, ensuring all commercial negotiations enable long term profitable growth whilst being conscious of the competitive environment.
• Responsible for the trade sales budgets, particularly the Co-op budget allowing for course correction.
• Responsible for the Co-op strategy to ensure that we are targeting the right products to the right distribution channels and partners and ensuring that our co-op funds are invested in areas that give us the greatest return on investment.
• Responsible for the commission budget strategy.
• Responsible for ensuring accurate monthly/quarterly/annual forecasting of marketing funds.
• Ensure Business Partner agreements/CTAs are signed, compliant for audit and in place in a timely fashion.

Trade Partnerships:

• Be an ambassador and face of Celebrity Cruises to the industry.
• Develop relationships with key decision makers and influencers within the travel industry.
• Ensure Celebrity Cruises has maximum exposure in travel trade newspapers and at key events/conferences.
• Ensure the trade partners have the right tools to sell more efficiently and effectively.
• Support the team in exploring new channel prospects ensuring they will deliver growth profitability.
• Work closely with all functions within the organization to ensure the right balance of support to the trade is given so Celebrity Cruises is the premium cruise line of choice.
• Work with the Training team to ensure we continue to develop our training programme and continue to provide the trade with the best face to face and online training.
• Responsible for competitive intelligence gathering, providing regular updates to the organisation alongside appropriate recommendations.

People & Teamwork:

• Provide leadership, motivation, and personal development to your direct reports and the wider team, including ongoing people development with emphasis on talent management.
• Ensure the most effective team structure and skill sets are in place to achieve plan and react to market trends.
• Ensure robust and effective sales targets to focus and motivate the team on the right product and to exceed revenue and guest targets.
• To work cross functionally globally across the Celebrity Cruises business.
• Ensure the sales organization has the right tools to enable Sales to sell more efficiently and effectively.

EXPERIENCE KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS

• Building Relationships – demonstrates gravitas and has an ability to present themselves effectively at all levels both internally and externally.
• Team Management – proven leaderships skills and is a team player with the ability to focus themselves & the team to deliver account plans, results, and key priorities.
• Influencing – able to persuade and take others on the journey.
• Motivational – self-motivated. Engages and motivates their team & the wider sales team.
• Style – leads with integrity, empathy and is self-aware. Innovate and creative thinker.
• Enthusiasm – demonstrates passion, enthusiasm and is eager and excited towards own goals and development of the team.
• Analytical – logically analyses facts, data, and situations.
• Commercial – proven commercial skills and results driven. Proactively uses commercial creativity to pre-empt possible commercial issues and encourages others to do the same.
• Negotiation – can use advance negotiation techniques to achieve joint financial goals in complex negotiations.
• Takes initiative – understands what needs to be accomplished and proceeds within the accountabilities of the job. Good at identifying the problems and always look for a solution.
• Organization and Planning - can formulate ideas related to the steps of achieving the objective and capable of juggling many tasks at once. Can place and maintain order in a busy environment and urgent situations.
• Selling – has a skill to convince and influence others to purchase a product or service.
• Persistent – is tenacious despite encountering setbacks and obstacles.
• Written/Language - clear and concise communication & presentation skills detailing the level of interest in formulating words that convey the meaning.
• Proven experience and success of managing and motivating a team of people.
• Matrix organization experience preferable.
• Leisure or travel industry experience preferable.

INTERNAL/ EXTERNAL RELATIONSHIPS

• The total EMEA business
• EMEA Leadership Team
• Senior Level stakeholders and business owners across EMEA
• Trade partners, media and institutions of the travel industry
• Key Global Stakeholders
• Counterparts in Royal Caribbean and Silversea (RCG) Stakeholders

What we Offer. At Royal Caribbean Group, we are client-centric but put people first. We have a culture where everyone is trusted and valued in equal measure, whatever your role in the company. We are propelled by people. Our employees and crew are the driving force behind our success. Our aim is to recruit, develop and retain world class people, who come to Royal Caribbean to do the best work of their careers.

We are committed to employee development, and you will have the opportunity to learn from some of the most experienced people in the business. We regularly reward and promote success, encouraging staff to take on new challenges and responsibilities to aid progression.

Our remuneration package includes our competitive pension, private healthcare, life assurance cover to name a few. In addition, every permanent member of staff that works at Royal Caribbean is eligible for our cruise request program and friends & family cruise discounts.

With good transport links to our modern offices in Surrey, we have plenty of free parking, a free shuttle bus from the train station, on-site restaurant, and on-site gym. We take a flexible approach to work. We currently work a combination of days in the office and work from home.

Come join the team - Journey with us, succeed with us, grow with us.

We know there's a lot to consider. As you go through the application process, our recruiters will be glad to provide guidance, and more relevant details to answer any additional questions.

Thank you again for your interest in Royal Caribbean Group. We'll hope to see you onboard soon.

It is the policy of the Company to ensure equal employment and promotion opportunity to qualified candidates without discrimination or harassment on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, age, national origin, disability, sexual orientation, sexuality, gender identity or expression, marital status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Royal Caribbean Group and each of its subsidiaries prohibit and will not tolerate discrimination or harassment.

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