The former Thomas Cook shop estate has returned to profit this year for the first time since being acquired by Hays Travel.
Hays Travel bought Cook’s retail estate following the company’s collapse in September 2019. It took on all 555 shops but a number have been closed since, including 89 last year due to the pandemic.
Chief operating office Jonathon Woodall-Johnston said the shops had moved into a profitable position in January this year, adding it had taken slightly longer as a result of Covid.
Speaking at the Hays Travel lndependence Group 2022 conference, he said: “Our objective was to turn Thomas Cook around in 24 months. We didn’t achieve it in 24 months, we did it in 27 months. It’s a fantastic achievement.”
He added the shops had remained in profit for February and so far for March.
He said there was still work to be done to fully integrate the former Cook shops but said staff had now “got the Hays culture”.
Woodall-Johnston told delegates said the Hays company as a whole had come out of the pandemic “stronger” despite taking a “big hit”.
He added there were currently no plans to use a loan facility Hays had arranged with Barclays Bank in 2021 as a contingency plan to survive Covid.
He said: “We have not used any of that loan and we don’t intend to. The likelihood is that we will not use it at all. In the 42 years of the business we have had zero debt. We have got a stable balance sheet.”
The group has also enjoyed a big increase in the number of new customers using its retail network in comparison with pre-pandemic, he said.
In 2019, 19% of customers were new to Hays Travel but this has risen to 54% of clients between May 1 last year and this month.
Woodall-Johnston said he saw the acquisition of new customers as one of Hays’ biggest success stories of the pandemic.