CREATIVE Travel Group – the company behind the
Holidays in a Box concept – ceased trading this week with 160
staff believed to have been made redundant.
Creative Travel folded on Monday, although the trading status of
Holidays in a Box remains unclear.
The Holidays in a Box concept involved consumers buying a box
from a third-party retailer which contained a travel voucher that
could then be used to book directly with a tour operator.
An ABTA spokesman said it had not received any claims as Travel
Weekly went to press. “The trading status of Holidays in a
Box is still unclear but we have had confirmation from CTG’s
finance director that Holidays in a Box did not collect money from
members of the public,” he said.
“Instead clients paid money directly to ABTA members with
whom Holidays in a Box placed their bookings.”
The company was headed up by former Going Places Holidayline
head of commercial Nigel Smith, who pledged to get the Holidays in
a Box concept into 7,000 shops by Christmas.
First Choice said it stopped selling Holidays in a Box in June
due to poor sales. A spokeswoman said it was unlikely it had any
outstanding obligations as vouchers tended to be redeemed
quickly.
CTG claimed Lunn Poly ran a pilot scheme with Holidays in a Box
in 10 shops in January, however TUI said it held talks with CTG but
never actually sold the product.
A source told Travel Weekly the business had been having
financial problems “for some time”.
CTG sold 10 affinity businesses to Travelcare in May, including
its travel clubs for British Telecom, British Gas and the Civil
Service Motoring Association Cruise Club, but having lost its core
database as part of the deal, sales plummeted further.
“After the deal, sales just dropped and it was hardly
getting any calls at all. They just couldn’t turn it
around,” the source said. The Altrincham-based company also
held the trading names of Holiday Café and
Lastchancetravel.co.uk.
CTG also managed loyalty programme Nectar’s flight
fulfilment and had done so since September 2001. Nectar said
it
had transferred bookings to World Travel Management.
No-one from CTG was available for comment.