SUNQUEST PRESENTS SWEEPING CHANGES FOR WINTER 2012-2013

Friday, 14 September 2012

SUNQUEST PRESENTS SWEEPING CHANGES FOR WINTER 2012-2013

Changes in aircraft, careful filtering of properties and sound retail offering presented to VIPs during Drake Hotel event

Zachary-Cy Vanasse

Lynn Dergousoff, commercial director, Sunquest; Steve Butchart, vice president, Sunquest; Dean Moore, chief operating officer, Thomas Cook North America & Dawn Rzepka, senior director of sales, Thomas Cook Canada Inc.

Steve Butchart, vice president, Sunquest, was frank and forthcoming while addressing those in attendance at a VIP reception on Thursday night.

Launching Sunquest’s winter 2012-2013 product at The Drake Hotel, Butchart discussed the previous season’s problems and the steps the company has taken to fix them as it moves forward.

“If we look at the winter just passed, clearly you will know that [it's] not been the most stellar year for Sunquest. There were some errors made in both our planning and execution,” he admitted.

Flights

Butchart first discussed Sunquest’s aircraft miscalculation and said that the mistakes made previously would not be repeated in the coming season.

“Our aircraft... came across from the Thomas Cook UK fleet. This led us, unfortunately, to an inefficient program which, through the course of the year, led us to enforce too many program changes [and] schedule changes," he said. "Through the period of February through April, unfortunately we had too many maintenance issues with the aircraft, leading to long delays.”

Butchart next touched on the flight schedule of the previous season, which he said the travel agent community described as “terrible compared to the market.”

Steve Butchart, vice president, Sunquest

“So what have we done about that?” he rhetorically asked the 30-some selected representatives in attendance.

What Sunquest has done is discontinued the transfer of capacity from the European market into Canada with 100 per cent of the tour operator’s seat purchase now occurring with WestJet.

“Which means a stable program,” Butchart said. “A program that is highly reliable with very convenient flight times... Essentially all of our departures (75 per cent) are between 8 a.m. and noon. We have a flexible program now which allows us to take opportunity. We have far more frequencies in our program... all of which we couldn’t do when we were flying on our aircraft. So, we think that that has made significant progress against what we had last year.”

The winter season will see Sunquest flying from 15 gateways across Canada, including Victoria, B.C. to St. John’s, Newfoundland; twice daily flights from Toronto to Jamaica; and daily flights to Punta Cana and Cancun.

Sunquest is also offering lower taxes on all winter packages.

Properties

From a property offering perspective, Butchart said the large number of new properties Sunquest utilized last season also created difficulties for the company.

Dawn Rzepka, senior director of sales, Canada, Thomas Cook Canada Inc.

“We focused on a whole host of new hotels last year. Many of which were successful, from a quality perspective and from a margin perspective. But, unfortunately, too many were not,” she said.

For 2012-2013, Sunquest’s team has examined every property and removed any hotel which was not up to the tour operator’s quality standards or would fail to deliver the margin expected.

The careful filtering of Sunquest’s property offering now allows it to offer a program in which 95 per cent of its hotels are four- or five-star quality products.

“We really did listen to what you had to say, what your customers had to say and removed those [properties] that cause us customer service challenges,” said Rzepka.

Retail offering

Sunquest has also established what it believes to be a strong retail offer to encourage travel agents to book the brand for the coming season.

The tour operator has introduced a 10 per cent EBB commission across the board for all winter 2012-2013 bookings made before Oct. 31, 2012.

Sunquest has also maintained its loyalty program. According to Butchart, research indicates that it is “the number one loyalty program in the country.”

Other promotions created to drive consumer interest with Sunquest this season include: the ‘We Pay the Tax’ promotion; free access to the Plaza Premium Lounge in Toronto, Vancouver and Edmonton; the Price Drop Guarantee; Price Match Policy; and the Roulette Program.

“We do have a lot of consumer offers out there so that it is easier for you to promote our winter season,” Rzepka said.

Sunquest has reduced its groups promotions from a requirement of 10 passengers, down to any combination of eight passengers, including children.

In addition, Sunquest has shifted approximately $200 in what was previously fees and surcharges into the base price of its product, rendering that money now commissionable to travel agents.

“We believe that we’ve given you a very strong retail offer," Butchart said. "We’ve improved the flying program fantastically well. The hotel line-up is now back to something that we can be very proud of in terms of the quality perspective. And whilst it’s early, we’re very happy with what we’ve seen so far for this winter."

The Sunquest vice president finished by conceding that the company still has an uphill battle ahead of it, but that he believes they have the right pieces in place for it to be successful.

“There’s a long way to go. Clearly there’s a long way to go. But early signs are very encouraging.”

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