The world's largest travel group, Tui, has held up well despite the current economic challenges and achieved clear growth at the start of the winter season. In the first financial quarter to the end of December, the company recorded 3,7 million customers, which corresponds to an increase of six percent compared to the previous year. Tui CEO Sebastian Ebel explained that people continue to prioritize their vacation even in times of economic uncertainty. The increasing demand is also reflected in bookings for the coming months: there have been two percent more bookings for both the winter and summer seasons than last year.
Prices for travel rose by four percent, and the most popular destinations remain Spain, Greece and Turkey. Despite a slight decline in growth for the rest of the year, Tui remains confident and expects to continue growing for the year as a whole. Particularly noteworthy is the jump in sales in the period between October and December, when travel was weak, which rose by 13 percent to around 4,9 billion euros. Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes and special items (EBIT) were also significantly better than in the previous year at around 51 million euros. Nevertheless, the company had to report a loss of around 85 million euros to shareholders, which is typical for the winter months.
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