Will Disney weave its magic?
So, the millennium project that was to be a celebration of British cultural life has now been handed to a Frenchman! I hadapplauded myself on not yet having made reference to the doomed Dome at Greenwich, but now feel duty bound to express a view on the fiasco over its management.
According to the powers that be, a suitable British candidate could not be found to replace Jennie Page as chief executive of the New Millennium Experience; France it seems, had what we were looking for and Pierre-Yves Gerbeau is now entrusted with turning the Dome around in the same way as he has beencredited with revitalising Disneyland Paris.
Whether he is due the sort of accolades he has received is questionable, as some sources have revealed he was only one member of a large team confronting the challenge that Disney presented. Time will tell if he has it in him to do more than re-site the loos and encourage workers at the Dome to smile more vigorously!
I can think of many people within the travel and tourism industry who could reverse the downward spiral of the Dome’s appeal. Disneyland Paris was reinvented through the sacking of a thousandemployees – hardly an imaginative management move and certainly not an original one; I’d wager that most of you could do better.
The Dome had been dogged by controversy from day one and has created interest of huge proportions. In full view of a bemused global audience, the quality of Britain’s own managers has been found wanting; hardly the best advertisement for our economy. Gales of laughter are sweeping through the channel!
The irony in all this is that it has happened at a time when relations between France and Britain have been strained to the limit, with supermarkets refusing to stock French goods and a ‘just say non’ campaign. If Monsieur Gerbeau had been a lamb chop instead of a big cheese, who knows, he might not have made it through the blockadeÉ
We’d rather ‘go’ together…
It has to be said that, for the nervous flyer, recent incidents involving aircraft have not been helpful in allaying fears about crashes or hijackings.
One elderly gent booking his regular British Midland flight to Leeds with Kate wanted reassurance that British Midland’s safety record was good as he’d heard that “another one’s gone down, you know, and there wasn’t one survivor in spite of all that ‘life-jacket under the seat’ caper!”
His comments could not have come at a worse time for the woman whose package holiday booking I was just confirming. “You’d never go anywhere if you looked at life like that,” I quipped before she could change her mind. She smiled weakly by way of reply.
I pondered this as I answered the phone to a client whose holiday to Mauritius I had spent considerable time sorting out earlier in the week.
The client and her husband were due to fly British Airways, but she now wanted to know whether she could fly BA while her husband travelled with Air Mauritius or Air France. I jokingly asked if they’d had an argument to which she replied that no, it was nothing like that, but because they had three small daughters who would not be accompanying them. They had reasoned that it would be safer to take separate flights as at least the girls would have one parent should there be a plane crash.
When Emma at Cresta heard this, she assured me that she would check and get back to me, but as she rang off she added: “Have your clients heard ofmid-air collisions?” I said I dared not mention the possibility or I might lose the booking completely!
Denise, Cresta’s Reservations Supervisor, rang back to say they had secured Club Class seats with both BA and Air France departing on the same day. Jubilantly I rang the client only to discover that they’d had a rethink and had decided that in the event of a crash they’d rather ‘go’ together. I rang Debbie to retrieve the original seats which, thankfully, she’d held; maybe she gets this sort of thing a lot?
… and he just needs to go!
The phrase ‘champagne tastes and beer money’ sprang to mind when an elderly couple called in for a ‘last-minute deal’.
As his wife went to sit down, the husband asked where our ‘facilities’ were. From his brusque tone, I gathered that his need was urgent, but was tempted to ask if he was a loo inspector or whether he had actually come to book a holiday. He strode to the back office and disappeared to emerge some time later clearly better able to concentrate on the job in hand.
We proceeded to look at various special offers, they would not specify a budget other than to say they wished to spend as little as possible.
“We don’t want to be herded like sheep! Something independent would suit us,” said the wife. I changed tactics and offered a tailor-made holiday.
The old chap noticed that Nigel was free and asked him how he was keeping. In no time, Nigel was roped into the quest. I tried to warn him that what would suit them was way out of their price range.
Between the two of us, we offered the couple a host of possibilities, none of which they were prepared to pay for. In the end I was forced to explain that they wanted to pay herded sheep money for tailor-made quality and they’d have to compromise somewhere along the line.
“Can’t you give us a discount?” said the old boy. “We did do a big booking with him when we went to Australia,” he continued, nodding at Nigel.
They stood up, muttering about having to find someone to look after their animals before they booked, and left.
I looked up their ‘big booking’. It was two consolidated seats to Australia in 1992. Like I said: champagne tastes, beer money and long memories!