Thomson plans to have 25 of its ‘holiday design stores’ open by Christmas, and is seeking a location for its first London shop.
The travel giant launched the first of its new-look stores in Bluewater shopping centre in Kent last year and now has 19 such stores; the most recent opened at Meadowhall shopping centre in Sheffield in October. Thomson declined to reveal where the six new stores would be.
Doug Glenwright, Tui Travel general manager for retail transformation, said two further stores would open in early 2015 and one was likely to be in London.
He said the two Westfield shopping centres – in Stratford and White City – were being considered but it was still “very early days”.
Glenwright said it was important to make the holiday process fun, adding that that hadn’t necessarily been the case in previous years.
“If you make it a fun experience, customers will come back,” he said.
“In the past there has been too much focus on the process of booking the holiday and not enough on fun.”
He also said there had been too much focus on ensuring customers booked on their first visit, rather than letting them go away with a brochure, after which “they will come back and book”.
He said the new-generation stores had resonated with customers, adding: “When we replaced two units with one bigger store at Bluewater we set targets and the store outstripped these because we focused on the customer experience.”
As well as introducing two new stores, Thomson is also refitting others to give them aspects of the holiday design store concept, such as advice bars, interactive maps and booths.