Thomas Cook’s head of cruise and commercial Jenny Ellis is to leave in September after more than 30 years with the company.
Her departure, to pursue new opportunities outside the group, follows the creation of a new supplier relations structure, which includes commercial activity, run by Deborah Aylward.
The cruise repackaging business will now come under the product division and will be run by Emma Pratt until Julie Berry returns from maternity leave in October.
Ellis, who is well-known in the trade, has led the integration of the supplier relations teams following the joint venture of the Thomas Cook business with The Co-operative Travel in 2011. This has involved consolidating teams and identifying and delivering synergies.
Ellis has held her current role in charge of cruise and commercial at Thomas Cook for seven years, which has involved negotiating with key suppliers of third party products and responsibility for the group’s overall cruise strategy across the high street, online and direct.
Prior to that, from 2001 to 2006, Ellis was commercial manager for Thomas Cook, managing a portfolio of key accounts, and business support manager for the distribution director and regional sales manager (1993 to 2001).
At Thomas Cook’s management conference in 2010 she was awarded the chief executive’s Employee of the Year award for 2009.