"Night Owls" Take to the Web for Travel Bookings

MEDIA RELEASE

New Zealand “Night Owls” Take to the Internet for Travel Bookings

Auckland, Thursday June 1 2006 - Travel bookings via the internet continue to climb with many New Zealanders using the web between 8 pm and 7am to look, book and pay for their holidays.

Latest figures produced by online agency ZUJI.co.nz says about a third of their bookings are received during these hours, revealing that people enjoy the web experience.

“The growth of online travel sales is disproportionately large to the increase in the global travel market,” explains ZUJI New Zealand general manager David Allen. “In New Zealand outbound travel growth increases about 6% per year – online sales are growing significantly more than this.

“Just over 30% of all bookings on ZUJI occurred between 8pm and 7am when traditional travel agents are closed,” says Mr Allen. “This shows that the convenience of 24 hours a day, seven days a week access to travel choices on ZUJI, matched with the ability to confirm the booking and pay online in real time, is helping to drive a shift in travel buying habits across Asia Pacific.”

ZUJI has offices throughout Asia Pacific including New Zealand, Australia, Singapore and Hong Kong. In New Zealand ZUJI operates under license by NZX listed, Gullivers Pacific Travel Group.

The New Zealand night time sales are in contrast to Australia ZUJI sales where 25% are made between the hours of 8pm to 7am and 63% during work time between 9 am to 6pm.

Only 17% of all travel through ZUJI’s Asia Pacific offices is booked during the weekend with the remainder Monday to Friday.

Fourteen per cent of New Zealand travelers booked international flights within the same week of travel, many of which were long haul flights.

Says Mr Allen: “The motives behind the short lead time may reflect a component of small to medium business traveling at short notice, or a consumer trend to wait until the last moment to book their flights online. Flight booking trends imply all travelers can be inspired to travel with tempting deals within a week of travel.”

Sydney and London were the top ranked destinations respectively for New Zealanders, while Auckland was the number one visit for Australians.

Delhi as a destination for ZUJI travelers had climbed to 20th in top destinations, driven in part by more bookings from New Zealanders.

The issue of international electronic tickets across the ZUJI booking sites had also surged, with only 47% now receiving paper tickets compared with 85% two years ago.

About Gullivers

Gullivers Travel Group (GLS) is the largest outbound travel services business in New Zealand focusing on the wholesale, retail leisure and corporate travel markets. The Group has 280 outlets and offices located in all the main metropolitan and provincial areas throughout New Zealand - more than any other travel company. The group also has Wholesale Operations in the UK and Australia.

The Gullivers Travel Group comprises a portfolio of high profile travel brands including United Travel, Holiday Shoppe, Travel Smart, the New Zealand Master Franchise for Harvey World Travel, GO Retail, Atlantic Pacific Radius, Signature Travel, Biztrav, Gullivers Holidays, Gullivers Ticketing, GO Holidays and Ticketing, Travel Reward Incentive Programme (TRIPS) and online businesses of Travel.co.nz and Zuji New Zealand, as well as a travel software development and distribution division.

The Group's leading New Zealand market position, extensive retail franchise network sales of NZ$1billion and wholesale sales exceeding NZ$400 million of ticketing and holiday packages in New Zealand per annum, together with its long established relationships with more than 8,000 travel suppliers and products worldwide gives it significant buying power. This means the Group is well-placed to provide its customers with an extensive range of air and land based travel services at competitive prices.
About ZUJI
In 2005 ZUJI was unanimously voted Asia Pacific’s ‘Best Online Travel Agent’ by the readers of TTG travel magazines from 17 countries across Asia Pacific.

ZUJI gives travellers a choice of over 60,000 hotels with traveller reviews, 400 airlines as well as offering package tours, cruises, car hire, attractions and other travel products online. Each ZUJI site is unique and ZUJI has teams and travel websites in:
Singapore: www.zuji.com.sg In English
Hong Kong: www.zuji.com.hk In English and Cantonese
Taiwan: www.zuji.com.tw In Traditional Chinese (ZUJI operates as ZUJI Buylow in Taiwan)
Australia: www.zuji.com.au In English
Korea: www.nextour.co.kr In Korean (ZUJI operates as ‘Nextour’ in Korea)
New Zealand: www.zuji.co.nz In English (site powered by ZUJI, and managed by Gullivers Pacific)

In May 2006, ZUJI announced that it plans to establish a ‘Travelocity India’ site and team in India this year.

ZUJI’s ‘Travel Partner Network’ division allows third-party travel suppliers, agents and web sites to harness the travel booking functionality of ZUJI for flight, hotel, packages, activities and other travel content and products. ZUJI’s travel network partners include: Lonely Planet (Asia); Yahoo! (Korea); MSN (Korea); Atnext (Hong Kong); Naver.com (Korea); Korean Air (Korea, providing for ‘Honeymoon’ and ‘Woman’ travel portals); Apple Daily Online (Taiwan); and Blue Holidays (Australia).

ZUJI is owned by Travelocity®, an international leader in online travel. Travelocity is owned by Sabre Holdings Corporation (NYSE: TSG), a world leader in travel commerce.

ENDS

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