WA Shearings bids for adventurous travellers

WA Shearings revamps to attract adventure travellers

WA Shearings today unveils a new look and product range that it hopes will help shed its image as an old-fashioned coach operator and attract more adventurous over-50s holidaymakers.

The company was formed out of the merger of Wallace Arnold and Shearings and until now its product range has consisted almost exclusively of coaching trips for mature travellers.

But the 2006 programme includes traditional cruises, river cruises, fly and flop holidays and city breaks.

WA Shearings has launched three programmes – The Best of Britain and Ireland, Classic Europe and Oceans & Shores – which it claims will challenge preconceptions that persist about holidays for the over 50s.

Among the highlights are a tour around Ayers Rock in Australia on a Harley Davidson, an 18-day Reef and Rainforest Discovery trip and a Grand New Zealand Rail trip with stopovers in Kuala Lumpur or Singapore.

“With the merger of the two companies we had a chance to look at what the over 50s really want,” said WA Shearings sales and marketing director Karen Gee. “We’re now offering flexibility and adventure. We’re not cutting back on our coaching holidays but we’re giving people the choice to do other things. In the long-haul brochure, the average cost of the holidays is £4,000 per person, so we are certainly not operating just at the budget end.”

Before the merger, Wallace Arnold and Shearings were of similar size, each taking around 500,000 passengers a year. Gee said the combined operation would save up to £5 million a year in operational costs.

“In the UK we both had coaches going to around 1,000 different points, all of them half full. Now we have consolidated, improved our load factors and cut costs,” she said. “This year the new company aims to hold on to those one million passengers and next year build substantially on that with the new programmes.”

Although still targeted at the over-50s, Gee said the company’s holidays could be enjoyed by all ages.

“What we are seeing now, for example, is daughters going on holiday with their mothers,” she said.

WA Shearings will spend an undisclosed amount on television and newspaper advertising to promote its new look and products.

The company also launches a new-look website today, www.washearings.com, but said up to 90% of its business would continue to go through the trade, despite research which claimed a growing number of older holidaymakers were booking via the Internet.

“Our research shows that people will use the Internet for research, but will prefer to book their holidays in front of someone they can discuss it with,” said Gee. “Most of the calls to our call centre are actually from travel agents.”

Report by Jeremy Skidmore