EasyJet Holidays is to continue to seek ways it can work with travel agent partners, it confirmed at its official launch last in London last night.
The joint venture between the budget carrier and the Lowcost Travel Group has ambitions to join, and maybe even surpass, the UK’s big two tour operators Tui Travel and Thomas Cook.
The deal marks another significant milestone for the fast-growing Lowcost group that, it was announced to staff this week, will move from offices in East Grinstead to the former GB Airways base in the Beehive buildingm, Gatwick Airport’s original terminal, in May.
Wednesday’s event saw consumer and affiliate partners invited to mark the launch of EasyJet Holidays but Lawrence Hunt, Lowcost chief operating officer, said it was working on arrangements for third party trade partners.
“We are working on a model for agents,” he said. “There are lots of hurdles to get over, regulatory being one of the main issues, but I think we are pretty confident that the right trade partners can add value.”
From the day the joint venture was sealed Lowcost has been keen to involve the trade and Paul Moore, EasyJet communications director, said the airline’s resistance to working with third parties has waned as it had grown in European markets where agents are more dominant.
He said with EasyJet’s 50 million customers, 200 aircraft and 540 destinations aligned with Lowcost’s 10,000 hotels and transfers in 450 gateways EasyJet Holidays had the potential to be “as big as it liked”.
The focus for the new venture will be on flexibility with the carrier’s flying programme allowing customers to book holidays of any duration with their own choice of departure times, rather than being saddled with the times dictated by traditional tour operators.
The first pubic advertising poster campaigns feature a holiday scene jigsaw and attractive budget lead-in prices, but EasyJet believes the venture has the potential to tap into high end luxury travel too.
Hunt said the response since the programme went on sale, initially through Teletext Holidays, four weeks ago had been phenomenal and that the firm was busy revising its forecasts on the back of early demand.
The most popular destinations in the first weeks of trading have been Palma, Majorca, and Prague indicating the joint venture’s ability to prosper not just in the traditional beach destinations but for city breaks.
“The volume of traffic has been unbelievable.” Hunt said. “Everything we put in the business plan we have had to rewrite.” Lowcost has homeworkers up and down the country taking calls for EasyJet Holidays and the firm said around 38% of bookings are being made on the phone, in line with the level Lowcost Travel Group sees for its own business.