NEWS ROUND-UP IN THE PICTURE: Tui shop reopens
Staff at Tui’s Southport branch where agent Cassie Hayes was killed in January have thanked the public and travel industry for their support. The Merseyside store reopened last week after a
refurbishment. It had been shut since January 13 when the 28-year-old assistant manager was attacked in front of customers. She later died in hospital. The staff issued a joint statement: “We’re incredibly
thankful for the support we’ve received from everyone – our customers, family and friends, colleagues, the entire industry – to help get us to this point. “We’d also like to say a special thank you to Tui who
supported our decision to reopen the store and made sure we were really involved in its redesign. “It felt like the right thing to do in Cassie’s memory
and it feels like she’s still a part of our store.” The team is pictured in the revamped store.
Retiring Phil Norris looks back on 44 years in travel
Juliet Dennis
juliet.dennis@
travelweekly.co.uk
When Phil Norris started work as a UK sales rep for Thomson Holidays in the mid-1970s, the trade’s knowledge of Spain was a far cry from today.
Norris, who retires this week
after 44 years in the industry, including stints at Thomson Holidays (Tui), Thomas Cook, Jetsave, Unijet, Freedom Flights and most recently A2B Transfers, recalled: “We toured the country with a 16mm film projector to show agents what Spain was like. “We’d have 1,000 agents in a hall
and people would ask if you could drink the water. It’s incredibly hard to imagine that now, but it was a different era.” Norris – who was “hooked” after
taking agents on his first fam trip at Thomson – has witnessed wide- ranging industry change, highs and lows. In the 1980s, he worked for
PHIL NORRIS: ‘It’s nice to finish on a high. It’s such a fun industry’
Florida specialist Jetsave, one of the pioneers of low-cost transatlantic flights and holidays, when the US exchange rate of $2.40 to the pound saw Florida’s popularity soar.
10
travelweekly.co.uk 29 March 2018 “It was unbelievably good-value.
We were sending 150,000 passengers a year,” he said. Norris was also among those
to lose his job when his employer, XL Leisure Group, collapsed in 2008, one of the biggest failures the industry has ever seen. He said: “I got involved on the
holiday side when XL decided to offer a tour product with flights. Agents loved it. But fuel prices had gone up and there was no money in the business to buy forward. “The business grew too quickly.
It was a real shame: you feel you have let agents down.” Norris got back on his feet
thanks to a job offer from Renaldo Scheepers, chief executive of A2B Transfers owner Hoppa Group. He has spent the last nine years
there, most recently as business-to- business sales director, working with agents internationally as the company has expanded. He added: “It’s nice to finish
on a high. It’s such a fun, exciting industry to be part of.”
Silver Travel Awards attracts 25,000 votes in just one month
More than 25,000 votes have been cast for the 2018 Silver Travel Awards. The awards, for which Travel
Weekly is trade media partner, are voted for by consumers and recognise the travel companies and destinations that best serve the over-50s market. Former ITV news presenter
John Suchet will host the awards evening at the National Portrait Gallery in London on July 9. Silver Travel Advisor managing director Debbie Marshall said: “These awards give mature travellers the opportunity to recognise and reward the companies that are responding best to their ever-expanding travel horizons, meeting their needs and delivering their holiday dreams on the water, in the air and on the ground.” Voting is open
until May 15. To vote, go to research. net/r/silver awards 2018
John
Suchet will host
the awards
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