Author: Lee Fletcher

With the school summer holidays just weeks away, the UK’s major theme parks are vying to attract their share of the crowds by promoting their latest big rides and dusting off the old favourites. Weather permitting, 2012 could be a record year for UK park operators, with the promise of a massive influx of additional overseas tourists, drawn by the London Olympic Games, to potentially swell their visitor numbers. Thorpe Park is best placed geographically to benefit from any Olympic spin-off, being situated just south of London, near Chertsey, Surrey. No surprise then that it has launched a major new…

The Shard, a skyscraper located in the Southwark area of London, previously known as the Shard London Bridge, or the London Bridge Tower, has recently opened its observation deck, ‘The View from The Shard’. The Shard is the tallest building in Western Europe, at 1,016ft, and The View from The Shard observation area is housed on the 68th to 72nd floors of the structure. For the viewing platform’s official opening, tickets are being sold at GBP25 for adults and GBP18.95 for children. The viewing platforms are accessible by lifts, which will take the visitors to the building’s 68th floor in…

Qatar Holding, a Qatar-based investment company, founded by the Qatar Investment Authority, has announced the development of new Harrods brand hotels at prime locations worldwide. In 2010 the company bought the London-based, Harrods department store, for a price of around GBP1.5 billion. The recent launch of the hotel brand is part of the company strategy to develop and expand The Harrods Group portfolio. The company intends to open Harrods hotels in key cities around the world, including Kuala Lumpur, New York and Paris, and certain major cities in China. Preference will be given to construct on sites already owned by…

Ctrip.com International, a China-based travel service provider of hotel accommodation, airline tickets and packaged tours in China, is to partner with global hotel conglomerate, Marriott International, to offer the hotel company’s products to Chinese travellers. The new partnership between the two companies will be offering Chinese travellers a range of hotel accommodation and reward opportunities at around 3,600 participating hotels worldwide, which are operated by Marriott. Members of the Marriott Rewards loyalty programme may now earn Ctrip reward points when booking stays at Marriott International branded hotels across the world. Both companies are also intending to offer Double Ctrip Points…

The hospitality industry now has a standardised approach to measuring carbon footprints. The new procedure has been put together by the International Tourism Partnership (ITP) and the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC), in collaboration with UK-based, InterContinental Hotels Group. The Hotel Carbon Measurement Initiative (HCMI) Working Group, which has been launched recently, and which includes hotel members within the ITP and WTTC, is offering a global standardised approach for the hospitality industry and its customers. David Jerome, the senior vice president of corporate responsibility for InterContinental Hotels Group, said, ‘As an industry, we’ve standardised our practices around how hotels…

Generator Hostels, a company that operates hostels in Europe, has launched a sale of its accommodation for the month of July 2012. The company is offering its guests complimentary food for all bookings made in July 2012, subject to the travel being completed by December 28, 2012. Accommodation is available at its hostel properties in London (England), Dublin (Ireland), Berlin (Germany), Hamburg (Germany), Copenhagen (Denmark) and Venice (Italy). The company is also in the process of opening a new property in Barcelona, Spain. At the Generator Hostel Berlin, the offer is for a complimentary hot salted pretzel, on twin and…

Social media may be changing the way people communicate, but it will certainly not replace air travel, a verdict that comes as a relief to Airbus, an aircraft manufacturer. A survey conducted by the company, for which around 1.75 million respondents were questioned, revealed that in the future people will still be keen to travel by air, and meeting with others physically will not be replaced by online communications. By 2050, around 63 percent of people worldwide will be flying more than they are doing currently, according to the survey results. While 60 percent of respondents do not think that…

The Olympics may see a drop in premium travellers visiting the UK, said the UK-based airline holding company, International Airlines Group (IAG). The company has reported that premium traffic for the month of June 2012 has increased by 5.3 percent compared to the preceding year, while non-premium traffic increased by 9.6 percent in June 2012, from the earlier month. The company has stated that, ‘Underlying market conditions remain unchanged from last month. As we had indicated earlier in the year there is likely to be some near-term softness in premium traffic due to the Olympic Games.’ The company, which is…

Sheraton Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, a subsidiary of US-based Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, has announced the opening of its new Sheraton Jiaozhou Hotel, located near Qingdao city, on the Shandong Peninsula Coast, in China’s eastern region. The new hotel is owned by Qingdao Greentown Jiaozhou Bay Real Estate Development Company, and has 270 guest rooms, including 31 suites. Hoyt Harper, the global brand leader for Sheraton Hotels, said, ‘Sheraton debuted in Beijing as the first international brand hotel in China and we are very excited that Sheraton Jiaozhou Hotel is the first international brand hotel in Jiaozhou. Sheraton’s impressive…

Twelve airlines flying from the UK have decided to include their debit card charges in their headline prices, following a recommendation from the Office of Fair Trading (OFT), a UK government department. The new pricing policy will mean that the airlines will include their card charges, which will be displayed along with their headline prices, when visitors to online booking websites are searching for a flight. The twelve airlines that will be offering this service are Aer Lingus, Bmibaby, Eastern Airways, Easyjet, Flybe, Germanwings, Jet2, Lufthansa, Ryanair, Thomas Cook, Thomson (TUI) and Wizzair. Monarch Airlines scrapped their debit card charges…