News that Hays Travel has bought up all 555 Thomas Cook shops within the UK comes as great news to the fallen travel company’s employees. The fact that Hays will also take on those workers comes as sure enough icing on the cake.
British journey agent Hays Travel says it will take over all the shops after the vacation firm collapses. The company already recruited some 421 former Thomas Cook staff, and the company says it intended to reopen the shops instantly. This will save as many as 2,500 additional jobs, not including the 100 additional positions Hays Travel says it will add at its Sunderland HQ.
Hays Travel founders, John and Irene Hays, had this to say via the announcement:
“Thomas Cook was a much-loved model using proficient individuals. We stay up for working with lots of them. The settlement will see Hays Travel purchase a complete of 555 shops across the UK, offering re-employment alternatives for a major variety of former workers of Thomas Cook’s retail operations who had been made redundant.”
Mr. Hays continued by calling the move a game-changer, a growth acquisition that will almost triple the company’s shops. The bigger story of how Christmas came early for Thomas Cook employees is revealed here at This Is Money. The long and short being John and Irene Hays took a tremendous gamble bailing out the once venerable Thomas Cook. It is, however, a gamble that could come with a humongous win. And the couple has never accrued any debt, unlike either Thomas Cook or the larger TUI.
Thomas Cook left about 600,000 clients worldwide stranded when the 178-year-old company went bottom-up. The corporate’s demise sparked 22,000 job losses worldwide.
Hays Travel is the UK’s largest independent travel agent. Before the Thomas Cook move, the company had an annual turnover is more than £1 billion, and employed around 1700 people.