‘I met inspirational people – and some nutcases’


Damian McDonough


PAUL RICHES worked for Club 18-30 from 1982-88, as a rep in Benidorm and Majorca and a resort manager in Ibiza and Tenerife The Club 18-30 brand is a bit like the Sixties: if you remember it, you


Brian Young (front left) with other reps


party for Club 18-30


would have had elsewhere. Plus, as a rep, your wages were your commissions so you had to get good at selling – or you were in trouble!” Andy Tidy, managing director from 2001 to


2006, recalled: “It was one of the few places where you could genuinely go from the bottom to the top irrespective of formal qualifications. “Many people ‘graduated’ from Club 18-30 to


have highly successful careers.” The operator was widely admired for attracting


hardworking, ambitious individuals. If Only managing director Andy Freeth, who worked for rival Escapades, said: “As a non-Club 18-30 rep, we admired their work ethic from afar.” So, what happened? Rewind the clock a few


months to when Cook announced its strategic review. Many knew the writing was on the wall.


Following media publicity fuelled by ITV’s Club Reps TV show in 2002, Cook sought ways to adapt the brand to a more sophisticated youth market. Ironically, bookings increased after


the show, but, in 2004, Thomas Cook boss Manny Fontenla-Novoa admitted the brand had “reached maturity”. Attempts to reinvigorate the brand did little,


with passenger numbers falling to about 45,000 a year from highs of 100,000 in its heyday. Brian Young, a Club 18-30 rep from 1988


to 1992 who is now managing director of G Adventures, said: “Hotels have evolved. Club 18-30 needed to change, but didn’t.” Vertical Travel Group business development


director Damian McDonough, at Club 18-30 from 1986 to 1993, said: “People now want cool beach bars not organised trips. Tastes have changed and Club 18-30 is no longer relevant.” Rather than slugging warm Sangria out of a


jug, the new “social” generation of millennials wants something different – edgy, cool, adventurous, cultural, unusual and, above all, ‘Instagrammable’. For Club 18-30, the party is well and truly over.


weren’t there. So was it really all sun, sand, sangria and shenanigans? For me, it started like that. The chance to spend six months in the sun, with people my own age, having as much fun as possible, seven days a week. Then reality kicked in: staying out until


the last clients went to bed and getting up before the first ones rose in the morning, spending time with people you had nothing in common with and regular 12-hour airport delays. It’s been well documented that at Club


you learnt a great deal about running a ‘mini business’. But most important of all was the ability to put a smile on your face, when all you wanted to do was collapse in a heap. I met some complete nutcases


(mostly other reps!) but also some inspirational people, many of whom I keep in touch with today. It certainly is a special ‘Club’ and will remain so, for those fortunate enough to be in it.


1995: Club 18-30 is sold to the Flying Colours Leisure Group.


1998: Thomas Cook buys Flying Colours, including Club 18-30, for a reputed £57.5 million.


2000s: In the early to mid- 2000s, Club is run as part of Cook’s UP Trips division before being brought back in-house in 2008.


2018: From a peak of 100,000 people a year, numbers fall to between 50,000 and 70,000 passengers annually and around 45,000 this year.


May 2018: Cook


announces a review and potential sale.


October 2018: Cook confirms Club 18-30 to close on October 27 after failing to sell the brand, valued at about £5 million.


18 October 2018 travelweekly.co.uk 15


Paul Riches (far left) and


Danny Talbot (third left)


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