ABOUT SARAH

Sarah Colgate is a Tourism, Hospitality & Events Growth Specialist with over 20 years inside the travel, tourism and hospitality industries, as an operator, not a consultant. She has owned and run three tourism businesses of her own: Aquaduck Gold Coast, Aquaduck Sunshine Coast and Southern Cross Tours. She carried the risk, made the payroll, and paid the OTA commissions herself.

At Aquaduck she grew revenue 36% in 10 months, improved net profit per passenger 200%, and shifted online sales from 4% to 47% of turnover. She rebuilt Southern Cross Tours after COVID, doubling sales in the first 100 days.

During COVID she went to bat for tourism operators, meeting with government ministers and politicians to fight for the mum and dad operators who needed help. That experience confirmed what she had already seen: the financial fragility of most tourism businesses is structural, not bad luck. And it is fixable.

Sarah has served on the Destination Gold Coast Board, is Deputy President of the Gold Coast Central Chamber of Commerce, and sits on the Tourism Advisory Board of Experience Gold Coast. She has been a finalist in the Gold Coast Women of the Year Awards and the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast Business Awards.

Today she works with tourism operators who know the business could be more profitable, more direct, and less reliant on whichever OTA is taking the biggest cut this year.