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A New Year message from our Founder, Andy
“If a week is a long time in politics, then a year in travel is an entire geological era. The nature of our jobs, is that we rarely have time to pause and reflect – but I’ve managed to find space to do that recently. And I can’t quite grasp how much things have changed over the last 12 months. Of course, the last three years have seen more upheaval and change than we could have ever thought possible, but (thankfully) the changes in 2022 were positive ones from a travel point of view.
The world is open
With Japan’s reopening in October, every country in our portfolio (and almost across the globe) had removed Covid travel restrictions. We certainly raised a glass of sake to celebrate that milestone! Andwe waved goodbye to 2022 having sent a record-equalling number of happy clients off on their holidays over the year – something we couldn’t be more thrilled about.
Reflection complete, we can now turn our attention to 2023, which I expect to be a year full of exciting travel adventures. We’ve been preparing ourselves by sending members of the team off on research trips across the world: Costa Rica, Jordan, Vietnam, and Morocco have all had visits from HA, checking in on our favourite experiences and digging for new ones, and we’re now planning the next round of these trips. We love travelling ourselves, almost as much as we enjoy arranging holidays for you, so the relaunch of these research trips has been very welcome news in HA Towers.
We’re here to help
I’m not wilfully sticking my head in the sand and ignoring the elephant in the room: inflation and the squeeze on household incomes. Surveys tell us that holidays remain an essential part of people’s budget planning, and we really want to ensure that you’re able to take the holiday you want without breaking the budget. The average price of the holidays we’ve arranged has increased by less than 2% compared to the start of 2022. Prices are increasing throughout the world, but our experience and knowledge means we’re great at finding ways to deliver the same wonderful holidays, whilst avoiding these price rises.
Here’s to 2023
I hope you were able to find some time to relax and enjoy the festive season, and of course, I also hope you found some time to start thinking about your holidays for this year. I’m heading down to South Africa in February with my family – a country I know really well, but haven’t visited for a number of years. So, there’s a lot of holiday excitement in our household – I can’t wait to see my young girls enjoying their first safari.
I’ll sign off by wishing you all the very best for a prosperous 2023. All of us at HA look forward to helping you arrange travels bursting with memories, moments and experiences to remember over the year ahead!”
Andy Hunt, HA Founder
