All Leisure boss thanks trade partners
All Leisure boss Roger Allard has thanked agent partners for their support after the collapse of the company and has apologised for the extra workload.
But he said only a minority of bookings for Swan Hellenic and Voyages of Discovery would have come through the trade, and that it was business as usual for Just You and Travelsphere, which have been acquired by G Adventures.
Speaking after days of intense media coverage of the company’s failure, some of it accusing Allard and fellow directors of milking the company before letting it fail, the industry stalwart insisted he had done all he could in difficult circumstances.
"How many companies fail with money in the bank," he said.
"Unless the world suddenly improves over night, what do you? Do you wait and fall off the cliff later in the summer, or do you act responsibly and go in the lowest part of your booking cycle?"
Allard, 62, blamed a perfect storm of problems which showed no signs of letting up.
"In my 45 years in the industry, which has always had challenges, this has definitely been the most challenging time," he said.
"Who would have thought a few years ago that Turkey would have been in the situation it’s in, and who would have foreseen what’s happened in France and Brussels."
He said the industry was very resilient but he feared there would be other failures this year.
A report by insolvency firm Begbies Traynor has identified 33 travel business in ‘critical’ financial distress and more than 2,500 others in ‘significant’ distress.
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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