Advantage and TTA Worldchoice dismiss merger suggestion

Advantage and TTA Worldchoice have dismissed a suggestion they could merge as a response to a high number of agent failures in the last year.

The prediction was made at the Global Travel Group conference on Monday by Virgin Holidays sales and distribution director Chris Roe.

Advantage chief executive John McEwan said he could see no benefit in Advantage merging with another group.

“You can never say never, but consolidation would have to be on terms that were in the best interest of our shareholders, and I can’t see any reason to do that," he said.

“Advantage has grown its membership over the last three months and we are the largest consortium in terms of the volume we generate. There have been closures but there are still new people coming into the industry.”

Gary Lewis, TTA/worldchoice operations director, added: “Worldchoice is stable and TTA membership has grown. If the market shrinks there could be mergers but nothing of this sort has been discussed.”