Edwards Coaches and Dinesh Hirani, Groups Sales, Accor UK
Accor hotels has rewarded the loyalty of its staff and clients with a special workshop and awards dinner held at the group’s Mercure London Watford hotel between January 24-25.
Eight awards recognised achievements of coach operators and wholesalers. Of particular interest to the coach industry, Shearings was crowned Coach Operator of the Year; Albatross won the Group Coach Wholesaler of the Year category; and the Partnership Achievement Award for Groups and Coach Operators was won by South Wales-based Edwards Coaches.
“We’ve been holding the workshop sessions for the last five years,” explained Dana Lewis, Director of Leisure Sales at Accord UK. “Each year they’ve got bigger and bigger. When we started we had 25 of our UK and European hotels present and 20 of our clients. We’ve always done things like casino nights, but this year we had 66 hotels from our Ibis, Novotel and Mercure portfolios.
“The 82 clients present for the workshop included coach operators, in-bound wholesalers, UK coach wholesalers. Of these, 62 attended the gala dinner.”
Commenting on the award, Emma Pennycard of Albatross told CBW: “We are delighted to be chosen as their group coach wholesaler of the year. We cooperate well with Accor and look forward to continuing and increasing our relationship with them in the coming year.”
Alan Clough, Tours Manager at Edwards Coaches, who is no stranger to awards, told CBW: “We’ve had a good and constructive relationship with Accor over the years. It’s always nice to get something for the cabinet.”
