n London last week for the annual trade show. Travel Weekly rounds up some of the news


Hotelbeds aims to treble sales of ancillaries range


Trade supplier Hotelbeds Group plans to treble sales through its Transfer and Activity Bank (Tab) in the next few years.


The strategy will be driven by


expanding the existing product portfolio to include additional tours, transfers and activities. The former Tui-owned supplier also pledged to continue to focus on providing its partners with “best-in-class” technology to make the upselling of ancillaries simpler and quicker. The company offers more


than 19,000 transfer options and 12,000 activity options in more than 650 destinations, including theatre, sport and theme park tickets, excursions and car rental. Partners include Disney Parks, Legoland and Open Camp, the first theme park in the world dedicated to sport. Tab managing director Javier


Arévalo said: “Several years ago we identified the opportunity for intermediaries to increase


12,000


Activity options offered by Hotelbeds’ system


revenues via the online upselling of ancillary services. “Now we plan to take this


to another level by expanding the product range further and developing our technology to provide our customers with the best possible solutions.” Tab’s portfolio is distributed


to more than 35,000 travel intermediaries globally in 120 source markets via the Hotelbeds Group distribution platform. Hotelbeds claimed strong sales


in 2015-16 from the UK, its leading source market worldwide. The fastest-growing destinations for UK travellers were Spain, the US, Portugal, the UAE and Mexico. Turkey, France


and Morocco saw the greatest decreases compared with the previous year. Carlos Muñoz, the group’s managing director, said: “Despite fierce competition in a market that shrunk this year, it gives me great pleasure to confirm that once again we have both grown significantly and outperformed in our most important outbound market. “In 2017 we’ll be even more committed to our investment in cost-effective technology that generates additional revenues for our partners.”


New York unfazed by dip in UK arrivals


UK visitor numbers to New York City are projected to dip this year after three years of growth. However, tourism bosses believe growth in


flight capacity, affordable hotel rates and a raft of new attractions will offset concerns around currency and political uncertainty. Visitor numbers for 2016 are projected to be


1.196 million, a slight drop from the 2015 figure of 1.207 million. Fred Dixon, chief executive of marketing organisation NYC & Company, said the broadly


flat performance could be viewed as a positive result against the backdrop of a declining pound and uncertainty following the EU referendum. “The UK is still our number-one overseas


market so we are relatively pleased that our forecast figure for 2016 is only marginally below what we were forecasting before the referendum,” he said. “The UK has a real affinity with New York, and with so much happening across the five boroughs, we feel the outlook is still very positive.”


Booking figures defy expectations of Brexit fallout


Latest industry data indicates that people are booking holidays earlier, confounding expectations that June’s EU referendum result would hit consumer confidence. Google search data, GfK booking


figures and Office for National Statistics departure numbers all indicate relatively positive trading, a Santander and Travel Trade Consultancy seminar was told. TTC director Martin Alcock said booking volumes for summer 2016 would end 4% up, with packages up 6%. Both short-haul and long-haul were up, reflecting the collapse of mid-haul destinations with Egypt and Turkey down 70% and 39% respectively. Bookings for this winter are up


17%, which Alcock said “shows there is an appetite for people booking early”. He noted a shift to shorter durations of six nights or fewer, with bookings up 30%. Looking ahead to summer 2017,


GfK reported bookings to date up 5% on the same period last year, with family bookings up 12% and six night or under trips up 58%. “There are some reasons to be positive,” Alcock said.


“Enquiries and bookings seem


to be up. Confidence is down a little, but not hugely.”


NEW YORK: The UK is city’s top overseas market 17 November 2016 travelweekly.co.uk 71


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80