Tag Archives: worldchoice

Triton would have stopped cruise cuts, says Freudmann

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Triton would have stopped cruise cuts, says Freudmann

By Lee Hayhurst

Triton would have stopped cruise cuts, says FreudmannThe recent cuts to cruise commission would never had happened if the old consortium superpower Triton had still been around, according to its former chairman.

Steve Freudmann, also a former Abta president and now ITT chairman and chief executive, said the now defunct Triton would have acted as a powerful force in opposing the cuts.

The super-consortium was formed by Advantage, Worldchoice and Global in the wake of Tui’s decision to cut commission to 7%, announced at the Abta Travel Convention in Marrakesh in 2009.

Tui eventually had to reverse its decision, but the group fell apart acrimoniously due to what was described as a clash of personalities within the Triton board.

Speaking to Travel Weekly on Wednesday during filming ahead of this year’s annual Barclays Corporate Travel Forum, Freudmann said:

“Had Triton still been in existence the reduction in cruise commission would not have taken place and we would not have seen some of the problems we have seen in recent years.

“Unfortunately it [Triton] fell apart due to personality clashes around the board table.”

Reflecting on the Triton era this week after he announced his retirement from Advantage, John McEwan said there were ideological differences of opinion.

“Triton did not work for different reasons. There were differences of opinion in how to lead things.

“George Begg (the Global owner) was clearly interested in optimising performance of the company for himself.”

Freudmann accepted Begg did have personal commercial motivations for making Triton a success but that these were shared by the entire membership.

“George was trying to maximise the value of his company but to do that he had to maximise the benefit for all of the members that formed part of the overall company.

“Yes, it would benefit George, he owned the thing, but ultimately we all had the same interests at heart but we could never see eye to eye.”

In the aftermath of the Triton fall out Global’s Australian owner Stella Travel Services was linked with buyouts for Worldchoice and Advantage, which unlike Global were both owned by their agent members.

However, The Travel Trust Association swooped for Worldchoice and the deal was finalised in October 2008 as Advantage officially left Triton. McEwan was chairman of Triton at the time.

McEwan said: “We [Advantage] have had approaches along the way but when I evaluated those offers with the board we came to the conclusion that there was insufficient value available to make it attractive for each member.

“It was felt we were in a position of strength. We were already the largest consortium by some distance. Members were really happy with what they were getting at the time and a one-off cheque for their shares was quite transient.”

Both McEwan and Freeudmann agreed that since the Triton days the consortia have become far less cut throat in terms of competing against each other and have developed in different ways.

“When I came in you had three groups all vying with each other for members. There was not the gap then that there is today.

“We have become different, we have a much more diverse mix of members. Global has a different model and Worldchoice has been subsumed in to the TTA. It retains its brand but the closure of the Peterborough office is a real break with the past.

“Advantage has a powerful corporate travel membership and in lesisure we have got a much different mix. We have all the big players in the UK like Barrhead and Dawson and Sanderson and we have lots of individual location members as well.

“Other consortia have large members but by and large the majority are smaller retail members.”

Freudmann said the consortia no longer see each other as major competitors. “They see the independence of the consumer as being their biggest challenge rather than the guy across the road [other consortium] because the guy across the road is having the same problems and challenges.”

Cook and Cosmos to turn up heat on Greece

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Cook and Cosmos to turn up heat on Greece

By Lee Hayhurst |  Sep 24, 2011 14:25PM GMT

Greece looks set to become a key battleground in 2012 with both Thomas Cook and Cosmos promising to ramp up their activities in the destination.

Thomas Cook head of mainstream Ian Ailles told TTA Worldchoice delegates at this weekend’s overseas conference that Manos was a brand that had been “under developed” in recent years.

And addressing the conference via video Monarch Group business development director Stuart Jackson said it was expanding its Greece portfolio. At the turn of the year Monarch ended a flights deal with Olympic Holidays for what was believed to be 250,000 peak season seats, bringing them in-house to support the Cosmos tour operation.

Jackson said Cosmos was trading well ahead of the market for summer 2012 at 20% up, against the overall market that was down 1%. He said TTA Worldchoice agents were 37% up for Cosmos.

He told agents Cosmos currently sold around 20% through independent agents but that the Monarch group did not put a cap on this and it was limited only “by the desire of agents to sell it”.

Cosmos believes it is gaining ground on rivals as agents look for an alternative to selling holidays provided by the big two and want the reassurance of a well known brand.  Despite the good start to 2012 trading he warned: “The industry has gone through a difficult period and that will continue. 2012 will be an even tougher year.

“During tough times it’s key that we select our partners correctly and work with people we know are going to around for the long term.” Ailles also reported that 2012 had got off to a good start although he too warned the economic backdrop meant that the next 12 months would be tough.

He praised rival Tui for its performance, saying it was benefitting from some of the changes made by its former management team. “It’s not easy to turn a tour operator around quickly. They have had the benefit of a couple of years [of doing this] and that’s helped them this year.

“I anticipate that some other tour operators as we get to the end of the season and the end of the cashflow cycle will fail. The good news is summer 2012 has got off to a great start. We are significantly ahead of where we were for Summer 2011. It’s about having the right product in the right market at the right time.”

Ailles admits Thomas Cook has ‘made errors’

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Ailles admits Thomas Cook has ‘made errors’

By Lee Hayhurst |  Sep 24, 2011 13:54PM GMT

Ailles admits Thomas Cook has 'made errors'

Thomas Cook head of mainstream Ian Ailles struck a conciliatory tone when accused by agents of poor standards of service at this weekend’s TTA Worldchoice in conference.

Conceding that the operator had not lived up to the standards it ought to aspire to he promised agents that they would be very much part of its distribution mix in the future and that it would sort out its problems.

Agents confronted him with complaints about product and accusations that Thomas Cook is increasingly impossible to deal with and undercutting them online. Chris Bailey, of Bailey’s travel, challenged Ailles to promise “an end to two-and-a-half hours waiting times to get through on the phone costing 10p a minute”.

Ailles said “yes”, adding Cook had to get to the root cause of the problems that were generating such calls from agents, and to make sure that phones were answered. “We are on a journey and we are trying to turn things round,” he said. “We know we have made errors in the past.”

Speaking to Travel Weekly after his presentation Ailles admitted that Thomas Cook “has lost touch with some of its core fundamentals”. “It is about getting back to doing some sensible things sensibly,” he added.

“It pains me to get some customer letters [of complaint]. We need to live up to our brand values. We have such a large number of areas to look at. I take the view no idea is a bad idea.”

During questioning Ailles was challenged by a delegate to trial offering agent partners rates to allow them to compete with Cook’s online pricing to see if that increased third party sales. Ailles did not rule that out.

He said although he had not seen the figures for the new Co-operative Travel joint-venture he envisaged Cook would be looking at achieving around 20% distribution through third parties.

For some non-mainstream product he said that figure would be “considerably more”. “We are very much open for business,” he told delegates. Cooks’s current level of controlled in-house distribution is thought to well below the 80% rival Tui Travel claims to be achieving.

Ailles said despite the three profit warnings Cook has been forced to issue which, prompted the departure of Chief Executive Manny Fontenla-Novoa, the firm would still make £320 million profit this year. He said divisions in other parts of the world like Scandinavia were trading well and it was the UK arm that needed turning around.

“We have worked pretty hard restructuring the management team after Manny and Ian (Derbyshire) left. There is no silver bullet. What we have got to do as an organisation is step up to the plate across a whole range of activities and that’s what you will see us doing in the next few months.

“We continue to have a strong commitment to the high street and see this as allowing us to have an interaction with the customer in a way you can never do online. We believe, and are very keen, to strengthen the knowledge and experience of the agent in interfacing with the customer.

“We have just done a joint venture with the Co-op that endorses all that I have said; we will stay in the high street, we have had a strong commercial relationship with the Co-op and we will continue to utilise the Co-op name on the high street. But it’s important you understand that our relationship is as important as it ever was.”

Asked about Cook’s low share price, which at one point during the last month valued it at below the profit level forecast for this year, he said: “It’s ridiculous, but we are in a strange market and have a hugely volatile stock market.”