TUI to add city break destinations
TUI Travel is to launch a city breaks programme within the next few years.
The travel giant is considering top selling city break destinations like Dubai, Paris and New York.
Managing director Nick Longman would not be drawn on a launch date but said the operator was currently working through the technology that will be used.
"It will be fairly soon," he said. "I’m not keen on ideas taking two or three years to come to fruition."
He said TUI was also looking at using third party airlines to add other core Mediterranean destinations that it currently doesn’t feature, like the Greek island of Mykanos.
Through these relationships with third party airlines, TUI is also hoping to be more flexible with its holiday durations, moving beyond the usual 7, 10, or 14-night stays.
Longman said the group’s future focus would be on seven of its differentiated products, known internally as the ‘Magnificent Seven’.
These are TUI Blue, TUI Magic Life, RIU, Robinson Club, Sensatori, Sensimar (formerly Thomson couples) and Family Life.
He said the Thomson Couples brand had been dropped because it was too constrained.
"We felt there were adults who wanted to travel together but who were not couples, so we’ve moved to the Sensimar brand," he said.
Another strong focus would be the youth market, he told delegates at this week’s ABTA Travel Convention.
Speaking about longterm plans to drop the Thomson brand, he said the UK would be the last market to move to the TUI brand and would learn from how the transformation goes in other markets.
Longman, who has been in the MD role since June, said the continual evolution of a business was crucial to its success.
He advised delegates to make changes when they are successful, rather than waiting until things go wrong.
"Be bold, be brave," he said. "Diversify to cover your risks, whatever you do, do it quickly, and most of all, listen to your customers."
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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