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Strong early sales herald hot summer
Juliet Dennis and Ian Taylor
The trade enjoyed a roaring start to the peak booking period on the back of the best early sales for a summer season in years.
Travel agents and operators
reported strong enquiry levels since Boxing Day, with some citing their best-ever bank holiday sales on Monday, January 2, following a buoyant December. Paula Barrett, head of retail at
Hays Travel, said: “We had strong sales increases in November and December, and even between Christmas and New Year it was busy. We’ve had more productive days than recent years; it could be the days holidays fell and the fact our ads went on TV on Boxing Day, earlier than usual. “We had our best bank holiday
Monday thisweek.” Baldwins Travel opened
some branches on bank holiday Monday this week for the first time. Joint managing director Nick Marks said: “There were a lot of enquiries. We are optimistic.” Miles Morgan Travel increased its post-Christmas TV marketing
spend by 40% on last year. Owner Miles Morgan said: “Interest is definitely stronger than last year; our sales indicate that. “The whole industry has
started to up its spend on TV marketing, which creates noise that can only be positive.” Gemma Antrobus, owner of Haslemere Travel, said overall trading had been positive, while Premier Travel director Paul Waters said: “Early signs are really encouraging.” Kuoni also reported a “good
start” with all-inclusive sales particularly strong. Analyst GfK reported summer
2017 bookings up 11% year on year to the end of November and revenue for the summer up 16%. All-inclusive sales to the end of
November accounted for almost half (46%) of passengers booked to date – 11 percentage points up on the same period a year earlier. Season-to-date passenger bookings for the current winter were up 15% year on year to the end of November. GfK declared the January market
as likely to “be one of the most interesting in the last 10 years”.
Tui: We’ve always heeded FO advice
Ian Taylor
ian.taylor@travelweekly.co.uk
The New Year’s Eve nightclub massacre in Istanbul highlighted the continuing terror threat ahead of this month’s inquest into the 2015 murder of 38 holidaymakers in Tunisia.
Thirty of those shot dead on the beach in Sousse in June 2015 were clients of Tui, and both the company’s procedures and the validity of UK Foreign Office advice are likely to come under scrutiny at the hearing due to commence on January 16. Operators and leisure airlines
were operating normally to Tunisia at the time, in line with Foreign Office advice. But Clive Garner, partner at
All-inclusive sales to the
end of November were up 11% on the previous year
law firm Irwin Mitchell, which is representing 20 of the families of those killed, said: “There are serious concerns about what was done in the face of what appears to have been an escalating threat of terrorist activity in Tunisia prior to the events in Sousse.” Tui UK managing director Nick
Longman said: “We always rely on the government to make a decision about safety and security. If it says you can’t travel, we don’t travel. If it says you can travel, we do.” Longman said Tui has placed
even greater emphasis on com- municating Foreign Office advice to customers since the attack. “We have always had links to the
government website,” he said. “Since the Tunisia incident we
have upweighted that. At every stage of the customer journey now we have references to the website.” Longman said Tui had also learned lessons from the damaging reaction to Thomas Cook’s handling of a 2015 inquest into the deaths of two children at the Louis Corcyra Beach Hotel in Corfu in 2006. “We looked at what happened
to Thomas Cook and learned from that,” he said. “We changed some of our procedures. We’re treating the inquest very seriously.” Coroner Nicholas Loraine-Smith
has promised a “full, fair and fearless” investigation into the
deaths in Sousse. › Nick Longman: Face to Face, page 17
5 January 2017
travelweekly.co.uk 5 3
Sousse beach, site of the 2015 massacre. Inset: coroner Nicholas Loraine-Smith
STORIES HOT
PICTURE: REUTERS/ZOHRA BENSEMRA
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