Why Luxury Escapes chief executive Adam Schwab wants his staff in the office five days a week

In an era where working from home is the norm, this multimillion-dollar travel company CEO has a firm message to young staff: ‘Work somewhere that does that, we’re not for you.’

Luxury Escapes CEO Adam Schwab says work from home for young people is ‘the worst thing ever’

These days, working a full week in the office is practically unheard of.

When you’re working for one of Australia’s great entrepreneurs, however, expectations are high and hard work is essential.

Typical industry standards don’t apply.

Adam Schwab is the co-founder and chief executive of Luxury Escapes, a multimillion-dollar travel company that he runs like a start-up. He wants his staff in the office five days a week.

“For younger people, I think working from home is the worst thing ever,” Schwab says.

“It’s hard to progress your career if you can’t learn from other people. If people can’t see you. Unfortunately, getting promoted is often based on just who’s in your proximity.”

Flexible working arrangements are always available for those who need them, Schwab says, but a reason is required. It’s not enough to just clock in from home without an excuse.

“We are massive believers in working collaboratively with other people and I’m very much different to the (software firm) Atlassian guys on (working from home),” he says.

“Obviously, if someone has a real need we’ll work around that. But if you’d rather work from home maybe just work somewhere that does that, we’re not for you.”

Luxury Escapes is a multimillion-dollar travel company. Picture: Jake Nowakowski

When you ask your staff to spend every day in the office, you need to sweeten the deal – and Schwab has ensured there are attractive perks to balance out what he asks from employees.

Working at one of the fastest-growing travel companies in the world, you cop a free breakfast and lunch every day, table tennis onsite, referral and baby bonuses and a company discount of up to 20 per cent.

It seems to be working. In fact, Schwab says the company’s retention rate is too high – a problem very few companies are burdened with.

“Probably 10 per cent is (a good balance) of people who leave every year – they get a different job or they’re retiring or whatnot. We’re probably below that now,” he says.

While Schwab says he would have never dreamt he would be running a company of this size – eight million global members with offices in Melbourne, Sydney, London, Barcelona and Singapore – it’s clear he was born with a strong entrepreneurial spirit.

He began selling school assignments in year 12 and law notes in university.

With good marks, Melbourne born and raised Schwab says he naturally fell into a career as a lawyer and worked at commercial law firm Freehills.

Schwab has ensured there are attractive perks to balance out what he asks from employees. Picture: Wayne Taylor

“My cousin was a lawyer, my uncle was a lawyer. You get ok marks and you think, might as well do law,” he says.

“I thought I really wanted to be a lawyer. And then you do it and you realise it’s really not good. It’s pretty boring. It’s really long hours. I was an okay lawyer … but (there were) people who were really, really good lawyers. I wasn’t ever going to be that.”

Luckily, Schwab’s best friend from school, Jeremy Same, wasn’t thrilled with his corporate job either, and the two decided to embark on their own adventure.

Inspired by seeing friends from overseas fork out high prices for subpar short-term rentals in Melbourne, the two – only in their early 20s at the time – launched a business offering affordable, better-quality accommodation.

Starting with one apartment furnished on a budget, the venture quickly grew to managing 50 apartments.

“We wouldn’t make money if (the apartments) weren’t full. So if the apartments were empty, we’d be slaughtered.

“So, it was actually a really dumb business. It wasn’t really scalable. The much better business would have been Airbnb. It was like a six-year apprenticeship though, we learned a lot of what to do, like how to treat customers.”

Luxury Escapes office in Melbourne. Picture: Jake Nowakowski

A few more ventures later, including a successful Groupon-style business, he landed on travel.

“Travel was always the best pick,” he says.

“In 2013, we realised we needed to create a separate brand for travel because if you wanted to work with luxury hotels … they want their own beautiful environment.

“So we created Luxury Escapes really for hotels to be comfortable in providing these amazing offers in a really nice environment.”

This was despite Schwab admitting the duo knew “nothing” about travel.

“If you told me at 18, you’re going to start a travel business, I would be like, ‘Sorry, what?’” he says. “I didn’t even know what travel businesses were. Neither of us had ever stayed at a five-star hotel.

“We went to Thailand in 2002 before we started work, and we stayed at, like, two dollar a night places. So it’s not like we were luxury travellers.”

In the years that followed, Schwab says he’s changed the business – which they say is on track to exceed $1bn in total sales – from a travel deals business to one more technology focused.

While Schwab concedes the company did lose a lot of revenue during covid, he says the business has now nearly tripled in terms of size, team and revenue since pre-pandemic.

His tech team grew from 30 people in 2019, to 130 today. His total team grew from 200 to 600.

Schwab says the business has now nearly tripled in terms of size, team and revenue since the pandemic. Picture: Jake Nowakowski

“We’re getting better and better data on our customers. So instead of sending one daily email every day, we send (individualised emails),” he says.

“And at the same time, we’re sending less communications and not just email.

“You might want to get WhatsApps or SMSs or whatever. Let’s communicate the way people want to communicate in a really interesting way.”

He describes the luxury travel business as akin to a BMW or Mercedes.

“Even though they sell super expensive cars as well, you can buy a $35,000 BMW. You can also buy a $60,000 BMW.

“Luxury doesn’t have to be Ritz Carlton or Aman or Park Hyatt. Luxury can be $200 a night or $100 a night hotel in Bali, if that’s what your vision of luxury is. So we’re not so precious that we’re only catering to the top 0.001 per cent of the country because you would have a pretty small customer base.

“We’re not going to sell a hostel room. We definitely have a level that we won’t drop to. We won’t sell a three-star room, but we’ll certainly sell a four-star, five-star, six-star and try to appeal to a wide array of people.”

Schwab says the business is on track to exceed $1bn in total sales. Picture: Jake Nowakowski

Schwab stepped away from the online travel agent in 2019, hiring a chief executive to take charge of the business. When he resumed the role during the pandemic, he says he did so with a different perspective.

“We thought, let’s get a professional manager to come in the business that’s probably got some great insights that I don’t have,” he says.

“When you go to start your own business and you become like the most senior, because you’re the only one there … you never have any experience in the middle.

“There’s stuff I was doing or we were doing that was just probably not very smart. And you don’t realise until you step out and go, actually, that was really dumb. I shouldn’t have been doing that.

“The biggest learning I had is just how important it is to hire amazing people around you. Ultimately the CEO is just claiming credit for everybody else’s work. So the better people you have, the more credit you can steal.

“I was also probably too hands-on on stuff that I shouldn’t have been. And so I’m (learning to) step back.”

He says he still treats the business “like it’s day one”. “We want to run the business like it’s a start-up,” he says.

Schwab stepped away from the online travel agent in 2019. Picture: Aaron Francis

“We want our team to be super entrepreneurial. We love when people try something and make a mistake and get it wrong, but then learn from it.

“You miss 100 per cent of the shots you don’t take.”

As if there wasn’t already enough on his plate, Schwab also runs a successful podcast with Adir Shiffman, chairman of Catapult Sports. The duo offers candid and often unconventional perspectives on the latest developments in start-ups, corporate Australia, and global business, on their show, The Contrarians.

“We’re approaching 100,000 downloads a month, which is a decent size for an unaffiliated business podcast,” he says.

“We get some amazing guests on there. We’ve have the guys from business podcast Acquired come on. We had the world’s best negotiator come on.

“We just love doing it. We’d do it if there were 10 listeners. It’s not a money making thing for us. We do it because we love it.”

His advice to aspiring entrepreneurs? Don’t force it.

Schwab’s advice to aspiring entrepreneurs? Don’t force it. Picture: Aaron Francis

“Everybody wants to be a founder and entrepreneur which is amazing but there’s, I guess, a temptation to just quit your work and to start writing ideas which is probably not the best way to do it,” he says.

“I think the best way is to solve a problem that’s tangential to your life that you’ve experienced because you’re in a great position to solve those problems.

“So, don’t force an idea. Let the idea come to you.”

Schwab also isn’t a fan of the “side hustle”.

“As soon as you realise there’s some sort of product market fit, take a leave of absence or quit your job and just put some real risk in it because if you’re not risking something you’re probably not going to try that hard,” he says.

“If it’s just a side hustle, it’ll always be a side hustle. I think, really go 100 per cent at it and take some real risk.

“And it’s obviously hard if you’re mid-40s with kids at school. That’s really hard. So it’s easier the younger you are.”

Originally published as Why Luxury Escapes chief executive Adam Schwab wants his staff in the office five days a week