00:00Hello, my name's Luke Patrick, I'm a reporter for Blackpool Gazette. I'm here on Burley
00:12Street in Blackpool where a new travel agency is set to open. HolidayTravelShop.com.
00:16My name's Richard Perry, I'm the director of Holiday Travel Shop Limited. We've got
00:24a new shop that's opening up in Blackpool town centre. We'll be selling all the favourite
00:28holidays with TUI, Jet2, EasyJet and all the cruise companies as well. Not only will
00:34we be selling package holidays to all the main destinations, but we've got another company
00:37as well called CoachBookings.com and they run all the coach holidays out of Blackpool
00:43and further afield we go to Europe and worldwide as well on the coach holidays. We also do
00:54the day excursions out of Blackpool, so if people want to come into our shop and want
00:57to do a day excursion, we've got day excursions going out of there as well.
01:03So what do you think are going to be some of the most popular, in the UK, Christmas
01:11holiday destinations this year?
01:13Okay, so this year the most popular destinations are Thurford in Norfolk, that's a fantastic
01:19Christmas show if you've never been, it's spectacular. Yes, so Thurford is the most
01:24popular Christmas destination, it's a fantastic display if you've never been before and the
01:36show is brilliant, it's a three hour show and there's also a fun fair there as well
01:40which people can go and enjoy with the fun fair as well. It's the most popular in the
01:45UK. After that you've got the main city breaks with the markets, so you've got London with
01:53Hyde Park, you've got Birmingham Christmas markets which are one of the biggest in Europe
01:58and you've got of course Manchester Christmas markets as well, plus all the main cities
02:02that have all the Christmas markets that are really popular over the Christmas period.
02:06How much of a boost to your business do you think the Christmas markets are going to be
02:11this year? How popular do you think they're going to be?
02:14Well, they always generate a lot of interest. People like to go to different places and
02:17have a look and see what the different towns are offering. Some of the markets are trying
02:22to compete with European counterparts and they come up with twists on it such as German
02:29food or different things like that to try and bring people in. A lot of them have the
02:35log cabins and they theme them so people can see what it's like to experience a different
02:42environment really.
02:46So when will the business be open? When are you opening the business?
02:52Okay, we're going to open the business in early November. So we've opened up in early
02:56November. We'll be selling all the package holidays and all the coach holidays. You can
03:03actually book online, so the online side of it is still working, it's up and running.
03:07So you can go to our website which is holidaytravelshop.com, on there are Jet2 and other package holiday
03:13operators and also we've got accommodation and flights that you can book directly through
03:17that website. We've got another website coachbookings.com, they run up through that all the coach holidays
03:24and you can book your day excursions, you can book any of your coach holidays leaving
03:29there including overnight destinations, London theatre breaks, any of the UK coastal destinations
03:39or any of the continental holidays as well through that website coachbookings.com. And
03:46they pick up within Blackpool.
03:48So obviously we're in a cost of living crisis right now, how will this company help people
03:57in Blackpool who have got less money with holidays this year?
04:01Well there's two ways of looking at it, coach holidays, we're going to be the biggest seller
04:04of coach holidays in Blackpool so people will be able to come in here, we've got all the
04:08agents agreements, all the local companies that deal with agents, coach holidays are
04:12amongst the most cost effective holidays you can actually travel on, you get picked up
04:16locally, sometimes you won't even need to travel to get the pick up point, it can be
04:20local for you and when you're on the coach holiday, as soon as you get on the coach you're
04:25on holiday, you know it's not a case of travelling to an airport and going through all of that,
04:30you get on the coach straight away you're on holiday and it's very cost effective.
04:33There's even long stay holidays as well, if you want to go to Spain, you can go for
04:3728 days and things like that and it's a very cost effective way of getting to Spain,
04:42especially if you struggle with the travel insurance side of things.
04:46On the holiday travel shop side of things, the way we look at it is we're offering a
04:50special offer for people that want to join and book a holiday with us, when we're opening
04:57in November, anybody that comes in we're either giving discounted or free return transport
05:01to the airport, so we're going to include transport within the package to the airport
05:05and back, which is a great deal for people.
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