Travel

#Tui boss insists dropping Thomson brand will not cost it customers

The German-based holiday conglomerate is phasing out the well-known brand after 50 years

Comments

The boss of Tui Group, the huge holiday conglomerate, has insisted that its decision to phase out the 50-year-old Thomson brand will not cost it customers in Britain.

The tour operator on Wednesday unveiled plans to unify its businesses under the Tui brand in the wake of last year s merger that saw London-listed Tui Travel combine with its main shareholder, Germany s Tui.

The move means that both Thomson and First Choice, along with a raft of European travel brands, will disappear over the next three years.

Thomson traces its roots back to 1965, when Roy Thomson, the Canadian newspaper baron, launched the eponymous Thomson Travel package holiday business.

Peter Long, co-chief executive of Tui, said that the company s British brands would be the last to go and insisted that the disappearance of the old name would not dent demand for its holidays.

We will be very careful when it comes to the UK market in terms of how we do it and when we do it, he said.

We will migrate, to start with, small brands in some markets like Holland where we then learn from the experience.

We are not going to overnight just say Thomson is gone. We re going to think this through very very carefully. This is our biggest source market and whatever we do is going to strengthen our position.

The process will take two to three years and the UK will be the final market to undergo the rebranding because of its size , Mr Long said.

Tui s smile logo is already incorporated into that of Thomson, which provides a very strong link between the brands, he added.

Following its launch, Thomson Travel was a success with Britons emerging from the grim post-war years with the cash to swap holidaying at home for sunnier climes.

The company was established at the same time that package holidays were growing in popularity and eventually made its stock market debut in 1998.

It was bought two years later by Germany s Preussag, a sprawling business with interests ranging from mining to leisure. The German company was renamed Tui in 2002 and last year Thomson and First Choice catered for more than five million holidaymakers.

News of the rebranding came as Hannover-based Tui, which is listed in London and Frankfurt, confirmed that it had put its LateRooms online business up for sale and posted a narrowed underlying loss before interest, taxes and amortisation of 167.8m (£121m) for the three months to the end of March, from 201.6m a year earlier.

The integration of Tui Travel and Tui is happening faster than expected and the offloading of LateRooms, which was bought by First Choice eight years ago, is part of the process. Tui shares rose as much as 2.5pc on the results in early trading before closing down 3.7pc at £12.07.

Tui also said that its British business was expected to receive a lift from the general election. The victory of the Conservatives ensures there is consistency with the policies of the Tory-led Coalition, which will benefit Tui, Mr Long said.

The strengthening of sterling against the euro and dollar following the vote will also give holidaymakers a feel-good factor by providing a lovely backdrop for our customers when they get their spending money, he added.