INTRODUCTION

Global Travel Industry

The Travel Industry is one of the biggest service industry in the world. Over 1.45
Billion people travel in a year globally. It is expected that the number of travellers
in 2019 will be 3% to 4% more than that of 2018. With the increase in the
disposable income of people, the travel industry can expect to grow at a higher
rate. Some of the few industry which are the pillars for the Travel Industry are:

 Transportation (Flight, Trains, Car rental, etc.)

 Accommodation (Hotels, hostels, camps, etc.)
 Food (Restaurants, Clubs, Bars, etc.)
 Entertainment (Shopping, Casinos, Concerts, etc.)
 Finance (Insurance, Banking, Loans, etc.)

Without all the above industries, it not possible to imagine the travel industry in
this era.

The following factors have either changed or promoted the travel industry in
recent years:

 Online Booking: With the help of the Internet, it has become so easy to
access all the information and book everything online.
 Personalised Experience: Many hotels now provide personalised services
based on the choices of the customers.
 Automation & Robots: The trend of making the hotels automated with the
help of machines and robots to serve people, has changed the whole
industry. Although, many people think that it would be creepy to be in such
a hotel but many travellers still looking for some new experience.
 Influencers: There are a ton of influencers and especially bloggers who
keep travelling and showing new places to people which influence people
to travel more.
THOMAS COOK

Thomas Cook Group was a British travel company which operated as both, an
airline company and a tour and travel firm. The Group was founded after the
merger of Thomas Cook AG and My Travel group in 2007. However, the brand
"Thomas Cook" is 178 years old and was trusted by travellers globally. Recently,
Thomas Cook Group collapsed due to lack of funds. They have announced their
bankruptcy.

Thomas Cook Group collapsed on Monday, 23 September 2019. This caused

22,000 losing their jobs which include 9,000 people from UK.More than 150,000
travellers who were on holiday, lost their trip to home.

On 26 September, 2019, British Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) announced that

they have scheduled over 70 flights on Thursday (26 September) to bring back
16,000 travellers who were on their holiday to different countries. Their
programme would continue until 6 October. They have more than 1000 flights
planned to schedule for 10 days.

History of Thomas Cook Group

Thomas Cook Group is the oldest travel agency in the world which was founded in
1841. Thomas Cook founded the company by helping people travel by train. He
was a part of the Temperance Movement (A movement against Alcohol) and
arranged meetings for the movement and carried temperance supporters from
one British City to another.At the same time, he founded the Thomas Cook Travel
Agency and worked as the middle man for the travellers. Around 1860, the
company was arranging foreign trips and was the first one from the country to
take people to the US & Europe. It even arranged many world tours for travellers.

When Thomas Cook was succeeded in arranging many trips, he became sure
about this business and bought a shop on Fleet Street, London and started selling
travel accessories along with travel arrangements. In 1872, Thomas formed a
partnership with his son and renamed the company to Thomas Cook & Son.
Thomas' son, John Mason Cook provided expertise for the commercials of the
company.
Thomas retired in 1878 and John Mason and his son were now responsible for the
business. By 1888, the company was able to establish its offices in various
countries. By now, the company was developed in terms of its services. They were
able to arrange many activities in another countries for their travellers like Opera,
Mountain climbing, etc.The company then ran by the family members only and
remain same until 1924 when it was renamed to "Thomas Cook & Son Ltd." after
getting limited liability status.

The third generation of the family was even more successful as travel became
more popular. However, the company was sold to Hays Warf Cartage Company in
1942. After few decades, it was then acquired by British Government and was
renamed to "Thomas Cook Group Ltd." Thomas Cook Group Ltd. was acquired by
many companies until C&N Tourist AG acquired it and renamed it to "Thomas
Cook Group AG". Later in 2007, Thomas Cook Group AG was merged with My
Travel Group to form "Thomas Cook Group Plc."

Some of the reasons for Failure of Thomas cook are:

Funding

The major and the most obvious reason for the collapse of Thomas Cook is that
they were not able to secure the funding of £200 million or almost $250 million. If
the company would have received the amount of funding, it could have easily
survived instead of getting bankrupt.

The Debt

Thomas Cook had a debt of over $2.1 Billion. It is the reason the investors backed
out from investing in the company. The bosses of Thomas Cook even met many
lenders and creditors in London but failed to raise any fund.

The Model

The business model of a travel agency depends on segregating the different

aspects of traveling and packing it into one travel package. However, with the
easy and direct access to any service through the internet, the travel package or
going through travel agency has become obsolete.
Airline Expenses

Thomas Cook was all service travel company which even provided flights to the
travellers. However, operating an airline is not an easy task. An airline company
needs a lot of funds to bear its running cost. Costs like fuel, maintenance, crew,
etc. need to be fulfilled.

Brexit

The company is calling it as the top reason for the collapse. In May, 2019, the CEO
of Thomas Cook, Peter Frankhauser said: "the Brexit process has led many U.K.
customers to delay their holiday plans for this summer."And of course, one
reason of its failure is the common reason of most of the business
failure, resisting change. Thomas Cook was unable to adapt the changes according
to the new generation and ended up collapsing.

Why Thomas Cook India is Safe?

Even though the whole world is shocked by seeing the 178 years old company
collapsed, Thomas Cook India is still doing business as always. The reason behind
it is that Thomas Cook (India) Ltd. was acquired by Fairbridge Capital Ltd.
Fairbridge Capital Ltd. is a subsidiary of Canada based company, Fairfax Group.
Hence, Thomas Cook India is totally safe and still operational. However, they have
put this warning to let the users know that their company is independent of the
brand of Thomas Cook. Even though Thomas Cook India is still operational, they
have seen a sudden downfall in their share price. Their share price decreased by
5.23%.

Conclusion
Thomas Cook has been a great business since its birth. The company changed the
way people travelled. In the age when it was a luxury to travel to another city, the
company made it possible to easily travel to other countries. Along with its travel
business, it has also been a great financial company for travellers. However,
everything has an end. So, it is an acceptable truth and not a surprise that the
company ceases to operate anymore. Even though the travel industry has grown
as a whole, but it has also evolved in the process. So, if any company has to
survive in any industry, they need to adapt change according to the generation.