Our Journey

In late 2002 ex-corporate lawyer turned internet entrepreneur Charles Duncombe met with travel agency owner Richard Dixon. Shortly after, with an initial investment of just £6,000, Holidaysplease was born.

Holidaysplease grew rapidly. By 2005 sales were exceeding those transacted by Richard's high street travel shops. It was time to take Holidaysplease to the next level!

The business consistently achieved double-digit growth and was soon picking up national and supplier awards. In 2011/12 and 2013/14 Holidaysplease was named online travel agent of the year at the nationally recognised Agent Achievement Awards.

2013 saw John McEwan join the Board at Holidaysplease. John was Chairman of ABTA, a past Retail Director of TUI and Managing Director of Thomas Cook in the UK.

Recognising the power of the brand and the massive opportunity presented by the family holiday market, Holidaysplease bought online travel agent The Family Holidays Company.

We launched our first franchise model, The Family Holidays Franchise

We were delighted to have passed the panel to become a member of EWIF (Encouraging Women into Franchising).

Holidaysplease clocked up over £100m holidays sold and were awarded Top Online Agency at the TTG Top 50 Travel Awards.

In 2018 we launched The Holiday Franchise Company to expand our offering beyond family holidays.

We are proud to be accredited by the British Franchise Association who are the voice of ethical franchising in the UK.

We are the first travel franchise to be accredited by the Approved Franchise Association & the first travel franchise to be accredited by both the Approved Franchise Association & The British Franchise Association. This endorses our model and ethical approach to supporting our franchisees for success.

We were awarded Gold for Best New Franchise at the Approved Franchise Association awards in September 2019

We are the first and only travel franchise to be selected in the Elite Franchise Top 100 UK franchises.

Our training program was accredited by
the Institute of Travel and Tourism (ITT)

We were awarded recognition by Elite
Franchise by placing in the Top 100 UK
Franchises.

We were highly commended at
the AFA awards for Franchisor &
Franchise Leader of the Year.

We were recognised by The British Franchise Association and our membership got upgraded to Associate. 

Partnered with The Travel Foundation who are an international sustainability organisation dedicated to ensuring that tourism has a positive impact on destinations

We launched the British Franchise Association Franchisee membership for our franchisees to benefit from a additional  tools and support

We launched Hear To Help, which  our call coaching one-to-one sessions to built franchisees confidence and sales techniques

We partnered with the IGLTA, the worlds leading network of LGBTQ+ welcoming tourism businesses. We wanted to showcase our dedication to diversity within the travel sector

For the third year in a row placed in the Elite Top 100 UK Franchises sponsored by HSBC

We launched Supplier Search, to help franchisees find the right suppliers for their customers holiday needs

We launched Sales Bands & Awards, to recognise and celebrate our franchisees achievement's 

Partnered with Trees4Travel to enable of franchisees to offset the carbon emissions for their customers holidays 

We partnered with Tourhound to give franchisees access to a dynamic tour search with different suppliers and itineraries 

We became members of the Cruise Line International Association (CLIA) giving our franchisees access to expert cruise training

We partnered with Widgety which gives franchisees the ability to showcase Cruise Ships, Itineraries, deck plans and brochures on their website

We launched Support on Demand our in house knowledge database where franchisees can get answers to their questions instantly

We launched Quote Builder, our custom built dynamic platform to ensure franchisees give suppliers all the information needed for quotes to ensure speed to market

For the fourth year in a row placed in the Elite Top 100 UK Franchises sponsored by HSBC

We hosted our first annual conference in Birmingham the theme was a World of Opportunity

We hosted our first-ever virtual awards evening to celebrate our franchisees achievements

We launched The Commercial Hub, a tool to help our franchisees keep up to date with supplier updates

We launched You Said, We Did, so franchisees can share ideas and we can keep them upto date with new developments 

Travel Counsellors acquired Holidaysplease our parent company

We launched The Partnership Hub, to keep our supplier updated on our growth and different opportunities to work with us

We launched HFC Teams, a platform to enable franchisees help and support each other

Marvellous Escapes became the first franchisee to achieve £1 million in sales in their first year of trading

Over The Moon Escapes became the second franchisee to achieve £1 million in sales in their first year of trading

We hosted our second annual conference themed one team