17th Apr 2007 07:02
Travelzest plc17 April 2007 Date: 17 April 2007 On behalf of: Travelzest plc ("Travelzest" or the "Company") Embargoed for: 0700hrs Travelzest plc Appoints Robin Sutherland as Managing Director, holiday.co.uk Travelzest plc, the British online travel group offering specialist travelprogrammes, is delighted to announce that Robin Sutherland has been appointed asManaging Director of holiday.co.uk, which is central to Travelzest's onlinedistribution strategy. Robin will join the Group on 23 April 2007. Robin joins from Expedia.co.uk, the largest online travel distributor in the UK,where he has worked for over five years, first as Director of Customer Analyticsand latterly as Director of Retail. Robin has been instrumental in shapingExpedia's retail and merchandising strategy and defining its dynamic packagepromotion model. He built the analytics function in the UK from scratch andoptimised marketing spend from mid-2003, which resulted in significantyear-on-year growth for 2004. Previously Robin was a Customer Relationship Manager at TheFirstResort.com andworked in market analysis roles for British Airways, Norton Rose, Northern &Shell, BPI Group and Farmfoods. Travelzest's holiday.co.uk and flight.co.uk websites have recently beenrelaunched with enhanced content and functionality. Holiday.co.uk moves frombeing a third party package holiday distributor to a full service online holidayportal providing a broad range of holidays, including dynamic packaging andaccess to the content of the Group's specialist tour operators. Commenting on his move to Travelzest, Robin Sutherland, said: "I was looking for a new challenge and believe there is an exciting opportunityat Travelzest to create something different that offers travellers andholiday-makers a wide range of choices, including the ability to bookspecialist, tailored holidays on the internet. I am very much looking forward toworking with Chris, Nishma and the rest of the team." Commenting on the appointment, Chris Mottershead, Group Chief Executive, said: "We are delighted to have attracted someone of Robin's calibre to lead theongoing development of our holiday.co.uk online portal. Robin's experience inthe online travel market and his understanding of consumer behaviour will beinvaluable in further defining the strategy for this business and drivingtraffic towards the Group's specialist tour operators' websites." Enquiries: Christopher Mottershead Travelzest plc 01442 874322 Emma Kane / Samantha Robbins / Duncan McCormick Redleaf Communications Limited 020 7822 0200 Background information on Travelzest Travelzest is a British on-line travel group with high quality brands offeringspecialist holiday programmes and services. Chris Mottershead, 48, the Group Chief Executive who founded Travelzest in April2005, has extensive experience in the travel industry and in working for bothlarge and small organisations. He was managing director of TUI UK between 2001and 2004 with responsibility for Thomson Holidays, Lunn Poly, Travelhouse andother travel businesses based in the UK. During that time, he steered thecompany through one of the most difficult periods for travel and still achievedrecord profits. Prior to this, he was President and CEO, North American LeisureGroup, Airtours plc, which he joined in 1999. His roles previously withinAirtours plc included managing director and finance director of AirtoursHolidays Limited. He joined Airtours from Aspro Travel & Inter European Airwayswhere he was Group Finance Director. The Group currently comprises: itravel2000.com itravel2000.com was founded in 1994 and is an online travel agent specialisingin the sale of travel and travel related products. Sales are made throughvarious internet web sites and a customer call centre located in Mississauga,Ontario. The greater proportion of itravel2000.com's business is winter-based,thus providing counter-seasonal revenue to the predominantly summer-basedrevenues of Travelzest's businesses in Europe. Holiday Express Holiday Express is one of the UK's leading on-line travel businesses. Itspecialises in both on-line travel fulfilment services and online travel sales.Holiday Express' retail business (acting as travel agent), provides packageholidays, charter flights and ski booking services, accounts for the vastmajority of its revenue and the remainder of its revenue is generated throughacting as a tour operator. Holiday Express owns a number of travel websitedomain names, including: - www.holiday.co.uk - www.flight.co.uk Fair's Fare Fair's Fare was established in 1995 and is the UK's leading firm of airfareanalysts, offering a unique travel planning service to both private and businessclients. The company seeks out the very best financial options, on all majorairlines, but primarily for long-haul travellers in the first and business classcabins of the world's leading airlines. VFB Holidays VFB Holidays is a long established, award winning tour operator, which providedholidays for approximately 24,000 passengers in its last financial year. VFB iscurrently contracted with the owners of approximately 350 holiday cottagesthroughout France for the summer season, and has booking arrangements with over150 hotels, most of which are privately owned and are located in rural orsemi-rural locations. VFB specialises in cottage holidays in France, but alsohas a number of other holiday programmes including: France a la Carte (hotelaccommodation), Corsica, Short Breaks, Escorted Tours and River Cruises. Best of Morocco Best of Morocco is a tour operator specialising in high quality, tailor-madeholidays to Morocco for individuals or small groups. It provides apersonalised service and its highly experienced and knowledgeable staff helpeach customer select the hotels / resorts from their large range which areappropriate for the customer's desired style of holiday. Best of Morocco is thepremier agent for the Marathon des Sables, a foot race that takes place inMorocco in April each year, covering some 230km. Best of Morocco provides thelargest contingent of runners for the race each year. Peng Travel Peng Travel was formed in 1971 to arrange naturist holidays for the UK market.Since then, it has grown to become Britain's biggest naturist tour operator. Ithas unrivalled experience of naturist areas worldwide and has selected only thebest. The range of naturist holidays offered is unmatched by any other Britishtour operator. Faraway Holidays Faraway Holidays was launched by Travelzest in August 2006. It offerstailor-made holidays to many of the world's top exotic destinations in the FarEast, Middle East, Indian Ocean, South Pacific and South America. Everydestination offered by Faraway Holidays will have been visited by at least onemember of the sales team, ensuring that customers receive informed andknowledgeable advice when planning their holiday. Tapestry Collection Travelzest acquired the assets of Tapestry Holidays and have launched arevitalised brand consisting of the very best of the Tapestry range. TheTapestry Collection will initially showcase the very best of Turkey and Cretefeaturing many of the most popular hotels, apartments and villas, together withsome exciting new properties. The Wow House Company Wow House Limited, trading as The Wow House Company, is a specialist UKaccommodation provider offering an exclusive portfolio of large, prestigioushouses to rent for short breaks in the UK. The company also offers acomprehensive event planning service. 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