You’ve just won a Selling Travel Travel for Every Body Award – what does this mean to you and how will this help you with promoting your accessibility offering?
Winning a Travel for Every Body Award is a tremendous recognition of the work we’ve done to make travel more inclusive.
At Ocean Florida, accessibility isn’t just a service, it’s a commitment embedded across every aspect of our business and one that the team have a genuine and vested interest in.
This acknowledgment shines a light on the importance of inclusive travel and validates the efforts of our team, from our Accessibility Champions to our leadership driving internal training and advocacy. It also gives us a platform to raise awareness, share our expertise and inspire both travellers and industry partners to prioritise accessibility.
Ultimately, the win reinforces our mission: to make travel the best it can be … for everyone.
Tell me a bit about how Ocean Florida is catering to travellers with access needs?
We believe holidays for those that are disabled is a partnership which starts with us listening. Every traveller with bespoke needs receives personalised, proactive care, beginning with a detailed consultation and planning and continuing through concierge-style pre-departure calls so as we can make a trip as smooth as we possibly can.
We’ve taken meaningful steps to embed accessibility into every stage of the customer experience. This includes adapting our website to better handle enquiries for those that are disabled, whether it be visible or not. We introduced a new quoting and booking process and have developed our CRM to capture individual needs. We’ve also launched an Accessibility FAQ Hub, an in-destination guide, and created a dedicated Accessibility Concierge role to oversee quality and care.
Every holiday is tailored around each guest’s unique requirements, whether it be vision impairment, hearing impairment, mobility, or cognitive, and every villa and hotel we offer is vetted for real-world accessibility, not just compliance on paper.
Through our Accessibility Hub, we empower disabled travellers and their families with trusted advice, inspiration, and the confidence to explore.
Do you involve disabled people in your product planning and creation and how? Any best practice examples?
At Ocean Florida, accessibility is shaped with disabled people, not just for them. Central to this approach is Lindsey Brumby, our Accessibility Co-ordinator, who champions inclusive travel through both consumer and trade advocacy. Drawing from her lived experience with Arthrogryposis and her deep knowledge of Florida, Lindsey ensures every traveller receives personalised, barrier-free holiday planning.
She led the development of Ocean Florida’s Special Assistance Questionnaire, a key innovation that allows us to identify and understand diverse accessibility needs early in the booking journey. Beyond bookings, Lindsey and the team alongside her personally create bespoke accessible travel guides, from trusted restaurant and excursion recommendations to practical mobility advice, and conducts final concierge calls to confirm every detail aligns with each traveller’s individual needs.
Looking ahead, we’re expanding our efforts with the launch of an Accessible California programme in 2026, developed in consultation with a lived-experience advisory panel led by disability influencers.
Do any of your staff receive inclusivity and accessibility training? What does this look like?
Accessibility and inclusivity training are embedded across every level of Ocean Florida. Internally, we’ve introduced quarterly training sessions, appointed a dedicated Accessibility Co-ordinator, and empowered a network of over 20 Accessibility Champions throughout the business to ensure inclusive thinking shapes everything we do.
Leading this transformation is Anna Maria Janssen, our Group Product & Commercial Director, who has spent nearly four years developing and implementing Ocean Florida’s comprehensive Accessibility Programme. Her vision is clear: accessibility should not be an afterthought, but a shared responsibility integrated into every role and decision.
To bring this to life, Anna recently led a series of tailored webinars to help every team member understand their part in creating inclusive travel experiences. She also designed and launched Ocean Florida’s first eLearning modules on our internal training platform, Eloomi, equipping staff with practical knowledge of accessible travel, inclusive communication, and best-practice customer care.
Anna’s leadership has redefined how Ocean Florida approaches accessibility, not just as a service standard, but as a company-wide mindset. By continuously educating, empowering, and inspiring our teams, we’re building a culture where barrier-free travel starts from within.
How do you measure and improve accessibility in your products year on year?
With one in five Brits registered as disabled more than one in 20 of our holidays now include disabled travellers. Accessibility isn’t just a priority, it’s a responsibility. We know this also means continual improvement and as such we measure and improve our product offering by combining data, lived experience and real-world testing. Every villa, hotel, and experience is vetted for practical, hands-on accessibility, ensuring it meets the diverse needs of our travellers.
We continuously refine our offerings through guest feedback, accessibility audits and insights from our team. This allows us to identify gaps, implement improvements and track progress year on year. Internally, our dedicated Accessibility Co-ordinator and network of Accessibility Champions monitor standards, lead training, and embed accessibility across every aspect of the business.
What advice do you have for how travel agents can offer more accessible services and holidays to clients?
We know that accessibility starts with awareness, empathy and education, and travel agents have a crucial role to play in making inclusion the industry standard. The key is to listen, learn and lean on the right expertise. It’s no secret that there is a lot of fear in the trade around arranging holidays for disabled travellers but that’s exactly where we can help. Trust us as the experts, we’re here to guide, support and empower agents to serve every traveller with confidence.
Additionally, we’ve created our Accessibility Hub to not just be a resource for our teams, but a movement for the wider industry. It enables freedom of information, giving both customers and agents access to practical tools, transparent details and authentic insights that make travel truly barrier-free.
Our Accessibility Co-ordinator, Lindsey Brumby, plays a vital role in this work, regularly speaking at industry events such as Jenny Loves Travel and delivering training webinars that equip agents with the skills and confidence to better support disabled travellers. Her message is clear: accessibility isn’t just good ethics; it’s good business.
With over £18 million in sales, we’ve seen first-hand that inclusion drives opportunity and growth. By embracing accessible travel, agents not only build trust and loyalty with their clients but also unlock a significant and growing commercial market.
Ultimately, by trusting the experts, engaging with the right resources, and approaching accessibility with curiosity and compassion, travel agents can transform how disabled travellers experience the world.
