Speaking at the Hays Independent Group Conference in Vilamoura, managing director John Hays said having recently opened three more shops in the business’s traditional heartland of the north east, the region is “saturated”.
Meanwhile, he added the south is well accounted for as his recently acquired Bath network of about 60 shops rebrands as Hays while opening stores in towns like Exmouth and Bognor Regis is giving him full coverage of the area.
Now, while Hays is not looking at creating a national chain of agencies, he is confident that certain selected areas are ripe for the arrival of Hays Travel high street agencies.
He said: “The next obvious place is Leeds Bradford. We’ll be doing six shops in that area between now and Christmas.
“We’re looking for a lot more (shops) on the M62 corridor. We’re looking for 30 or 40 shops and we think the catchment area will support that number of shops.
“We’re looking all the time (for new sites). There’s a hell of a big gap between the north and the south (but) we’re don’t see national domination (as the future).”
Meanwhile, Hays added the agency is preparing a Christmas advertising campaign along the south coast as it rebrands its Bath Travel stores as Hays Travel and refurbishes them in an effort to attract a younger clientele.
The programme has seen 20 shops given a makeover in 2014, with the same amount this year and the same scheduled for 2016.
Hays said: “The reason we are doing it over three years is it takes two weeks to shut them (for refurbishment) and we can’t afford to close them other than in November and December.”
Hays also revealed up to 1,000 computers had to be bought to replace Bath’s terminals following the acquisition while an entire new software system was installed.
He believes this should help the business target a younger demographic, adding: “Clients that booked with Bath Travel loved it, the ones who didn’t said it was for older people and the shops were tired.”
He might not be looking at a national take over, but certainly Hays’ ambition is not lying dormant
