NEWS THE INTERVIEW
and more flights into our existing bases because we received feedback from our own customers that they wanted us to do more.” Flying out of Gatwick would have
pitched Jet2holidays against easyJet Holidays, which relaunches next month, promising the most-flexible package holidays in the market. Heapy says: “Competition is good.
It makes prices better for consumers and improves quality. But this flexible holidays thing it is claiming doesn’t worry me because we invented the flexible duration, fully-protected, package holiday 10 years ago. “I was a little confused when I read
the announcement as it’s nothing new, different or exciting. We’ve been doing it for years.” Heapy has also snapped up some
of Cook’s hotels over the last six weeks. “We were inundated with calls from hotels that wanted to work with us but couldn’t due to their Cook contracts, and so we have signed and welcomed a large number into our portfolio to work as true partners in our business,” he says.
travelweekly.co.uk
But he added that he was careful
not to sign more hotels than needed. “I didn’t want to dilute the volumes we were supplying to existing loyal hotel partners and, unlike other operators, we don’t sign hotels on an exclusive basis just to stop other operators getting rooms,” says Heapy.
Happy for Hays
Jet2.com and Jet2holidays have also given jobs to many Thomas Cook employees – from pilots, cabin crew and ground staff to call centre advisors, with some being taken on in its head office in Leeds. Heapy is also happy that so many
experienced Thomas Cook agents have been snapped up by Hays Travel, which bought the leases to Cook’s 555-shop network. “Now they are out of a vertically-
integrated structure, they will have the flexibility that independent agents have, and the freedom to pursue the correct commercial strategy for the retailer,” Heapy says. “We have already heard from so many former Thomas Cook agents
who, now they are with Hays, are delighted to be able to sell us.” Heapy described John Hays as
“an incredibly astute and courageous businessman” and said he thought the opportunity to take on the Thomas Cook shops and deliver great customer service as truly independent agents, was “a very smart move”. “I rang him to congratulate him
and said he would continue to have the support of Jet2holidays. We are already very close partners and we will continue to help them succeed – not just for John, but to help the entire independent travel agent community,” he says. Heapy is also looking forward
to working with other independent agency groups opening more shops, such as Barrhead Travel, Midcounties Co-operative Travel and more. To support Hays’ former Cook
branches, and all the other new independent agencies opening up, and to drive further growth, Heapy reveals he is looking to increase his trade sales team by 25%. And he is keen to increase the
proportion of trade business from its current level of about 27% as overall volumes grow. “There’s no reason why that can’t
rise to more than 30%,” he says. “Other operators have stated their
objective to increase their proportion of direct business. “That’s not our strategy. We want
our agent business to grow.” It was one of the messages
Heapy gave to the 350 delegates – including about 300 independent agents – who attended the operator’s Partners2Success conference in Spain this week. The conference came at the end of the busiest six weeks of Heapy’s career, following Thomas Cook’s demise. He says: “The fundamental problem at Thomas Cook was the debt. It just shows no brand has a right to survive. Brands have to work hard every day to survive in an ever-changing environment. There’s lots of examples where brands haven’t adapted and have failed.” You can be sure Heapy isn’t going to let Jet2holidays be one of them.
28 NOVEMBER 2019 13
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