Premier Travel in Mildenhall celebrates anniversary after unusual first year

A travel agency is looking forward to celebrating its one year anniversary after a rollercoaster 12 months.

Premier Travel opened in Mildenhall on December 13 last year, having been taken on as an outlet when the staff were made redundant by Thomas Cook.

Branch manager Amanda Heap was one of five staff to make the move to new premises across town after the independently-run Premier re-employed all workers.

She said the year started well.

“After everything with Thomas Cook there were a few days when we were anxious,” she said. “But the fact we could stay together was awesome, and to have this brand new shop was great.

“It is nice to be able to continue serving the community and the footfall past our shop (in Market Place) is amazing.”

Family-run Premier Travel is a far smaller operation than the former Thomas Cook and has 25 branches.

“The nice and intimate,” said Amanda, “It is small enough to care and large enough to make a difference.”

The Mildenhall branch got off to a strong start, with customers contributing to a strong December 2019 and January 2020.

But by March, the size of the once rumoured virus was becoming apparent and bookings slowed. Two of the staff have now left and others in the company were furloughed, while Amanda carried on in a coordinator role as part of a ‘cluster’ of branches.

“It has been a struggle and a challenge,” she said. “But we got on with it and we have lovely customers in Mildenhall who have supported us.

“The majority of bookings made for 2020 have been put back to 2021 or 2022. There are even some cruise bookings for 2023!”

“The business is now going really well. While it has been hard, Government aid to businesses has helped.The key for us to get through this has been to remain positive. We are helping customers and we take pride in being here for them.”

She said news of the vaccine had been a shot in the arm for bookings, with Thailand, the US, and the Canary Islands currently popular choices. There had also been a boom in family bookings.

“We did not expect the virus to go on for so long. We cannot stop it ourselves, but we have remained resilient.”

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