A little bit of history (because we are literally a history)…
I was fortunate enough to join the legendary Renshaw Travel as a travel advisor in 2005, a partnership that continues to our mutual delight to this day. It provides me with brilliant connections, lucrative contracts, worldwide recognition in luxury travel business and fabulous team to work with, while Renshaw Travel received in me a passionate professional with solid client base from Paris to Cape Town. For you, my clients, Renshaw Travel means six decades and tree generations of stable business, a guarantee that we were, we are, we will be, and we do take our reputation more than seriously.
So, the history.
Young Don Renshaw arrived in Vancouver from the East Coast of Canada in 1945 (In the photo he is on the far right).
After some time, homesickness led him to the Trans Canada Airlines office. He wanted to buy a ticket to his native Moncton, but found out that price was too expensive for him, and without much hesitation, he took a job at a ticket agency. He started as a teletype operator, then became an agent, and then the head of the airline’s reservations department. He’s got married and settled in Vancouver forever.
He started selling travel and established his own business in 1948. In 1952, Don Renshaw Jr. was born, and in 1954, Don Renshaw Sr. created the first tour operator company in the Canadian West, Cavalier Tours, sending Vancouverites to Mexico, Hawaii, China, Japan, Hong Kong, South -East Asia and Australia.
In July 1970, the Vancouver press named Don Renshaw Sr. “Mister Travel”: by that time, he had not only become a significant figure in the travel business, but also got known as one of the most gallant (and handsome) gentlemen in Canadian tourism. Is he not quite a movie star looking on those old photos?
Since 1974, the agency became known as Renshaw Travel after the owner’s last name, and at the same time, Don Renshaw Sr. began to involve his son, Don Renshaw Jr., who received business from his father in 1993 and has headed it ever since.
Son of Mister Travel can be called an essence of West Coast lifestyle: fit, sporty, casual, easy, low-profile, and keener to shorts and flip-flops than smart cashmere jackets. He literally grew up in travel agency, and I had so much to learn from him. The most useful lesson was that many issues which we face in our unpredictable job are not as grave as they appear and can miraculously be wannish by good portion of hearty laugh. Well, not all of them but surprisingly many.
By the time I joined Renshaw Travel, Don Sr. was long retired, recently 3rd time married, and living life in its full: travelling, playing golf and (at the age of 80!) ice hockey. He was living on the top floor of Renshaw building, and he would come down every morning in his smart cashmere sweater and perfect shoes to greet everyone with hugs and compliments. We had many profound conversations through the years, and ones I asked him (that time around 90 and still a passionate ice hockey player, sharp-minded and witty gentleman) what was the secret of his longevity and well-being. The answer was: “positive thinking, and hugging few people daily”.
Don Renshaw Sr. passed away in April 2021 at the age of 94, but anyone who knew him close enough still has hard time speaking about Senior in the past times. Somehow, we all thought he would be around forever.
By 1991, Renshaw Travel had completely specialized in deluxe travel and joined the elite travel club Virtuoso, an association of specialists in the art of travel. This makes us the first agency in Canada to be named Virtuoso and to receive all the benefits that come with it.
Time flies. 3rd generation of Renshaws, Mister Travel’s granddaughters Carly and Jessica, are in business and became great professionals. I’ve been with Renshaw Travel long enough to remember them as schoolgirls and to see how the grow and mature. New chapter of the story is in progress, and I’m excited to be part of it.
