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Hays Travel is hunting for more deals to boost its presence on the UK high street as the travel agent, which bought hundreds of outlets from collapsed rival Thomas Cook in 2019, bets on customers wanting more human interaction as travel disruption increases.
Marking five years on Wednesday since the £7.8mn deal, chair and owner Irene Hays said Hays Travel was “flourishing” despite many critical voices questioning the deal at the time.
“If it’s a simple [travel] transaction, people may book directly online,” Hays told the Financial Times.
She then listed recent events such as “airline disruptions, volcanoes in Iceland or wildfires in Rhodes and man-made geopolitical issues such as wars”, referring to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which have changed that equation.
“I think people want a human being there to help them out . . . if they have a problem, miss their connection somewhere, and need to get rebooked,” she said, adding that Hays’s 4,000 consultants are specialised in dealing with such problems since the coronavirus pandemic.
Nearly 90 per cent of bookings come through retail outlets for Hays Travel, which is based in Sunderland in the north of England. It has the largest number of travel shops in the UK, though it only started taking online bookings last year.
The company has made three acquisitions in the fiscal year to April, spending much of the £40mn outlay on investment in new stores. In May, it also bought 19 outlets of Miles Morgan Travel, bringing the estate up to nearly 500 outlets.
“If it’s the right geographic fit and the right company, we’re still acquiring [a brand],” said Hays, keen for more expansion.
Hays’s confidence in rising demand for travel agents among consumers comes at a time when the company has experienced 9 per cent annual growth in customer numbers over the past fiscal year, up to 1.9mn.
The previous year had brought an almost 50 per cent surge on the back of a post-Covid travel boom.
In 2019, Hays tripled in size when it acquired 550 outlets from Thomas Cook and added 2,500 staff to the payroll, although the pandemic brought job cuts.
Hays Travel, which will announce its full-year results on Wednesday, posted group revenue of £457mn, up 8 per cent from the previous year, while recording a pre-tax profit of £73mn, a 43 per cent surge based on customers travelling more often.
The average individual expenditure also rose by 9 per cent to £1,087, following a 30 per cent jump the previous year.
Abta, the trade group, said on Tuesday that 38 per cent of UK travellers had booked their holidays with travel professionals over the past 12 months, up from 34 per cent last year.
Many had wanted to “have someone to help and support if something goes wrong”, said chief executive Mark Tanzer, in a research report.
Travel disruption has become more frequent in recent years. Europe’s airlines, including BA, have suffered from air traffic control problems, bad weather and being banned from Russian airspace due to the war in Ukraine. Meanwhile, attacks on cargo vessels in the Red Sea have led to cruise lines rerouting itineraries.
