BTA sponsor profile: Newmarket Holidays

Founded in 1983, Newmarket Holidays offers fully escorted air-inclusive long- and short-haul, rail, coach and cruise holidays and breaks.  In addition the company offers an extensive UK live events programme.  A BTA sponsor for the past four years TravelMole spoke to the company’s marketing director Phil O’Sullivan.

How did you become aware of the opportunity to sponsor the BTAs?
Newmarket Holidays was nominated, and won, the Best Coach Operator Award back in 2011 and through this we became aware of the reach and credibility that the awards have and it seemed a very good idea to see if we could heighten our brand awareness by getting involved.

What do you hope to get out of the sponsorship?
Newmarket Holidays is one of the UK’s largest independently owned tour operators, but partly because of our history within the reader travel sector of the business our brand has been relatively hidden. Being involved with the BTAs has helped shine a light on Newmarket within the travel industry!

More than 1.25 million consumer votes were made last year via the BTA website where your company is featured on the home page. Are you happy with this level of brand awareness?
The very best thing about the BTAs is that it is voted for by the public and audited by Deloitte. All other awards within our industry are ‘judged’ by other travel professionals…well they aren’t the customers travelling! The BTAs give our customers the opportunity to express an opinion about the service that we offer them and get that opinion heard. For that reason we love it!

Have you given a prize for the prize draw?
Yes – the prize chest is a key ingredient in getting consumers engaged so we are happy to donate to it. This year we have given a week-long holiday to Croatia, which is a destination that is very much in vogue. We have a tour called The Istrian Riviera and Lake Bled, which combines a relaxing stay in the former retreat of the Viennese elite, Opatia, with some tours to not only stunning Lake Bled, but also Rovinj, Pula and also the beautiful cascading waterfalls of the Plitvice National Park.

Do you think the association with the BTA’s has heightened the company’s profile in the industry / with consumers?
Yes, particularly with consumers. As the BTAs have grown in importance and are more widely recognised year-on-year, you certainly have to be ‘in it to win it’ and with our involvement from start to finish we can engage our customers at the right time and with the right tone in our marketing messages. This in turn has led to good responses to the voting process but in particular in terms of congratulations and support when we receive an award.

What about contacts? Do you feel you’ve made valuable, useful industry contacts through the BTA association?
The actual awards ceremony is certainly a great networking opportunity.

Tell us about the actual Awards night – what do you like about it?
Firstly it is so well organised. It runs like clockwork. It has also developed into an industry standard and it’s very well attended so you can guarantee that almost anyone and everyone within the travel industry will be there.
I personally love the celebrity presentation of awards. Obviously some have been better than others – but Martin Bayfield last year was superb. His-off-the-cuff humour was brilliant.
Also the photo opportunities are so good and we can get them into comms the next day.

Have you taken advantage of brand awareness opportunities such as logo on BTA website or news through the newsletter Connect?
Yes – anywhere where we can get our brand in front of that size of audience has to be a good thing.

You receive a table at the Awards as part of the sponsorship package. Who do you invite as your guests?
Mostly other key stakeholders but also key partners. It’s a great night for team bonding and entertaining clients

Are you pleased with the return on investment (ROI) the sponsorship has brought – has it exceeded your expectations? Would you say it’s good value for money?
We have always thought that it is great value for money – however especially last year when we were able to present one of the stage awards, which coincided with the first year the awards were filmed for broadcast across Made TV’s city network.