Back In Positive Territory
To the strains of the Fleetwood Mac classic “Go Your Own Way,” which accompanies its new TV spot, Sunquest re-declared itself to the trade last night at a packed industry affair in Mississauga. Attended by top travel retail partners, tourist board execs and media, the TravelBrands event also launched a new program and direction for ALBATours and unveiled its innovative new monthly Insider Guides for agents, the first of which – Orlando – is hot off the press (and distributed with the Nov. 6 edition of Travel Courier).
But it was Sunquest that took the lion’s share of the spotlight with guests receiving special hard cover copies of the new Caribbean & Mexico goGuide, though retail copies will be soft-covered. Nearly square and completely red, with no photo on the cover, the guide – “we don’t use the ‘B word,” joked TravelBrands VP Brad Miron – is designed to emphasize the new look and feel of Sunquest, a tour operator that brand president Bryan Klompas acknowledged “has had its share of difficulties in the past few years,” adding, “Some people, it’s fair to say, thought that Sunquest was beyond repair.”
But TravelBrand CEO Frank DeMarinis reports that Sunquest is back in “positive territory” 18 months after former parent company Thomas Cook was purchased by the DeMarinis brothers, Frank, Joe and Enzo.
“We’ve turned the company right around,” he said to applause, adding, “This would not have been remotely possible without your [the retail travel trade’s] support.”
A succession of TravelBrands execs promised new exciting things from the company going forward, including desktop solutions and unmatched “deals of the week,” with DeMarinis noting, “the wholesaler of the past is not the wholesaler of the future… [And] we are the ones who want to grow with you. We want to earn your business back!”
In the photo: Showing off the new look of Sunquest and ALBATours at event at the TravelBrands headquarters in Mississauga last night were company execs (l-r): Bryan Klompas, Firdosh Bulsara, Enzo DeMarinis; Dawn Rzepka, Joe DeMarinis, Frank DeMarinis, and Brad Miron.
