NEWS GLOBE TRAVEL AWARDS 2019


Outstanding Achievement Award: The Globes ceremony kicked off with some special awards. Ian Taylor reports


Jet2’s Steve Heapy, with Stuart Parish, Travel Weekly; Lynette Dungey, of sponsor Avis Budget Group; and Lucy Huxley, Travel Weekly


Heapy insists award will be shared by whole Jet2 team


Steve Heapy, chief executive of Jet2.com and Jet2holidays, received the Travel Weekly Globe award for Outstanding Achievement following the remarkable expansion of the Leeds Bradford-based airline and operator.


Heapy joined Jet2 in 2009 after


working at MyTravel, Thomas Cook and Libra Holidays, and became chief executive in 2013. Jet2holidays is now the UK’s second-largest Atol holder, while airline et.com operates a fleet comparable in size to those of Tui and Thomas Cook combined in the UK. The airline is set to carry 12 million passengers in 2019. He was also honoured for leading industry initiatives on issues including false sickness claims and airport drinking. Heapy said “thank you” on


receiving the award, but insisted: “It’s a team thing, as with everything at Jet2holidays.” He said: “t’s hugely flattering


to receive this, but we’re a team and it’s a team effort. This award will be shared with everyone in


the company. It’s not about the individual, it’s about every player.” Of Jet2holidays’ growth, he said:


“We wanted to provide package holidays the way they used to be done, to go back to the days when the customer was treated like a king or queen.” Heapy said neither the airline


nor tour operator took precedence at Jet2, insisting: “We’re a leisure travel business, providing flights and holidays.” Asked about this year, Heapy


said: “We plan to continue to delight our customers. We have plans for growth and, if we do it correctly, customers will come back. The customer will decide.” Heapy insisted there would be


no shift in focus from selling via agents, saying: “Independent agents


16travelweekly.co.uk24 January 2019


“We wanted to go back to the days when the customer was treated like a king or queen”


are core to our business. We want to grow our business with them.” He told Travel Weekly in December that Jet2holidays intends “to maintain cast-iron relationships with independent agents”. He said: “I don’t want to start competing against the main source of our bookings. We made a pledge that independent agents on the high street will be our channel of distribution. We want to protect and nurture that. “We have a successful formula for


high-quality, great-value holidays. We’re not giving customers a reason to look somewhere else.” Heapy insisted: “There is enormous potential on the high street. That is why I want Abta to bring everyone [in the industry] together to call for [government] action on the high street.” He has also insisted Jet2holidays


will not follow Tui and Thomas Cook in owning and managing hotels, telling Travel Weekly in December: “We’re good at running an airline and a tour operation. We


don’t want to get into anything else.” › More special awards, page 18


Harding honoured as TW marks 50th


Former Travel Weekly managing director Trevor Harding received a special award to mark the 50th anniversary of Travel Weekly and his contribution in heading the magazine business from 1989 to 2007. Harding is a member of the British Travel & Hospitality Hall of Fame and has been president of the Institute of Travel and Tourism since 2003. He described receiving the


award from Travel Weekly’s Stuart Parish and Lucy Huxley, who is also his daughter, as “totally unexpected and somewhat emotional”. He added: “Travel Weekly is stronger than ever and still an important medium for agents. I didn’t foresee agents surviving as well as they have. The industry is in a strong position.”


PICTURES: STEVE DUNLOP


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