General agents have no future, says ski specialist

The sale of winter sports holidays through general travel agents is in terminal decline and those retailers will account for less than a fifth of the market by 2010, according to Crystal Holidays.

Speaking at the launch of its Ski Industry Report 2005, the operator’s managing director Stuart McLeod said winter sports fans were more knowledgeable than ever before and wanted expertise from distributors. McLeod said specialist call centres, which have highly trained staff, and ski websites, which provide a wealth of information, would prosper.

In January 2005, Crystal received 265,000 hits on its website, a 69% increase on the same month last year. Inghams’ site had 222,000 hits, up 45%, while Thomson was up 53% to 124,000 and Neilson’s site recorded 119,000 hits in the month, up 176%.

“The ski customer is looking for information and product knowledge, which is most readily available on-line than from a general travel agent,” said McLeod. “But the specialist travel agent still has a role to play because not everyone wants to book over the telephone or online.”

He added that customers were also seeking out specialist tour operators, both large and small. According to Crystal’s figures, the tour operator market for winter sports holidays was 626,000 for the 2004/05 season and it was the market leader with 148,000 bookings, some 23.6% of the market, up 0.3% on the previous year.

Inghams had 112,000 bookings and maintained its share of 17.9%. Thomson recorded 77,000 sales and saw its share slip from 0.2% to 12.3%.

First Choice saw a big drop in bookings, from 68,000 to 55,000 and its market share fell 2.5% to 8.8%. Neilson’s bookings were flat at 53,000, while MyTravel’s dropped from 44,000 to 40,000.

“One of the big changes is that First Choice has cut back its offering and reduced its number of flights,” said McLeod. “The ski market is now favouring larger operators with a full range of product and smaller operators which have found their niche. It’s following the same pattern as the supermarkets, where companies like Tesco and Wal-Mart dominate and niche players also thrive, but the mid-market can’t find or keep its customers.”

McLeod said the 2005/06 season had started well with operators reporting a high level of bookings. He added that a strong exchange rate should keep prices stable and predicted growth to Serbia, Bulgaria and the USA.

However, he said there were various challenges next year. The number of no-frills seats available to ski resorts would drop further after an 8% decline last season (see separate story).