Thomas Cook CEO predicts “return to growth” in 2010

Thomas Cook UK Chief Executive Officer Manny Fontenla (third from left).

Playa de Las Americas, Tuesday December 15 2009

THOMAS Cook Chief Executive Manny Fontenla predicted on Tuesday that Tenerife's crisis-hit tourist economy would begin to recover next year.

by James Tweedie

Speaking at the travel giant's annual convention at the Magma Arte y Congresos centre in the resort town of Playa de Las Americas, Mr Fontenla said that the tourism slump had “bottomed out” and the island was “on the way back to growth.”

He said: “Things have been tough in Spain because of the crisis,” pointing out that the weakness of the pound against the Euro had made non-Eurozone destinations like Turkey more attractive.

But he stressed that Spain remained the favourite holiday destination for Britons, Germans and Scandinavians and that it took “barriers” to discourage them.

Mr Fontenla said that British tourists were leaving it much later to book their summer holidays, a trend which he put down to job insecurity.

However, sales figures for December had allowed Thomas Cook to make its first year-on-year comparison since the present recession began, showing a 25 – 50 per cent rise.

Mr Fontenla was joined at the press conference by Tenerfie Cabildo first vice-president and Councillor for Tourism José Manuel Bermúdez,Turismo de Tenerife managing director Alberto Bernabé and hoteliers association ASHOTEL president José Fernando Cabrera.

Mr Fontenla announced that ASHOTEL members had agreed to reduce their prices, and pledged to pass the savings on to customers. “Now I can look forward to the future with a lot more hope than a few weeks ago,” he said.

Thomas Cook has a massive 50 per cent share of the UK to Tenerife tourism market, bringing 650,000 holidaymakers to the island every year.

Mr Fontenla stressed that he did not want Tenerife's hotels to cut their rates to the point of bankruptcy, but he added: “Sometimes in business we all have to take a little bit of pain.”

He said that the “good news” was that tourists were not “trading down” from higher-quality hotels, but were instead spending less money while on holiday.

He added that there was now a “huge demand” for all-inclusive package holidays.

Neither revelation was likely to give much hope to Tenerife's struggling restaurants, pubs, clubs and shops.

Tourism accounts for more than 60 per cent of the island's economy, despite investment in the the manufacture of renewable energy devices and the construction of the Network Access Point for west Africa in the Canaries.

The second largest industry is construction, which is heavily dependent on tourism and has suffered greatly from 'La Crisis'.

Some 2,200 travel agents attended the convention.

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