TomorrowWorld coming to Atlanta, USA

By on 2013
Story posted under news and tagged , , , , , , , .

TomorrowWorld Atlanta The organisers of the popular Belgium dance festival Tomorrowland announced last month that they were expanding their festival with TomorrowWorld starting in September. The creators of the festival Manu & Michiel Beers have grown the festival over the past 9 years into one of the world’s most anticipated music festivals proved by their ability to sell out 180,000 tickets in just ONE second.

Holland-based ID&T Entertainment is one of the world’s largest dance music promoters which along with Tomorrowland also run Sensation White. The move to the USA makes sense with media mogul Robert Sillerman who runs a majority of the glitzy Miami Beach nightclubs having purchased the North American division of ID&T Entertainment.

The expansion of TomorrowWorld into the US market makes sense with the Ultra Music Festival in Miami attracting more than 230,000 attendees in 2012. So there is certainly a growing demand in the US scene for large well planned music festivals so it will be interesting to see how the first TomorrowWorld festival at Bouckaert Farm, Atlanta, Georgia. The news that Atlanta was the location of the first US festival was announced by Albert Berdellans an employee of Ultra Music.

Based on the statement from the two Beers brothers it’s likely the TomorrowWorld festival will eventually tour every continent, they were quoted saying “It’s our ambition to organize a Tomorrowland on every continent. We have received requests for versions of Tomorrowland from all over the world… From rich Russians and Indians, to promoters in Australia, the US and South America. We will do it, but on our conditions, and only in places where we feel comfortable,”

Harry Potter 9 3/4 Shop Opens at London Kings Cross Station

By on 2012
Story posted under news.

Harry Potter Platform 9 3/4The infamous platform number 9 3/4 at King Cross Station in the Harry Potter series, is where witches and wizards board the Hogwarts Express to begin their new term at Hogwarts. Until now, muggles have never seen or been on this platform, but as of Saturday the 15th of December the Harry Potter 9 3/4 shop opened it’s doors to the non-magical public.

Covered by the national newspapers, including The Guardian and The Independent, if you would like to visit the magical 9 3/4 Harry Potter store, its doors are open from 7:30am until 10pm every day of the week. The new shop sits between platform nine and platform ten at Kings Cross Station and is located at Unit 1, King’s Cross Station, London N1 9AP.

Created by Jonathan Sands, who is the Founder and Chief Executive of the London Film Museum, and partners under license from Warner Brothers. Ahead of the Grande opening, Sands released a statement to the press, confirming that speculation of a Harry Potter Shop at Platform 9 3/4 in Kings Cross Station was true:

“We are proud to be opening the official Harry Potter Shop at Platform 9 ¾ in association with Warner Bros. Consumer Products as this is precisely where Harry’s journey to Hogwarts began. King’s Cross Station has recently undergone the most amazing re-development and we are delighted to be a part of it thanks to Network Rail.”

Designed to recreate the look of JK Rowling’s Ollivander’s wand shop, the Harry Potter Shop at Platform 9 3/4 sells replica wands used by characters including Professor Dumbledore, Hermione, Ron and the prodigal Harry Potter himself. The cheapest wand is priced at £22.99 with prices varying depending on which model you buy. All merchandise is approved by Warner Brothers and is therefore standard price.

With every collectible imaginable for the Harry Potter fan, products available to buy in-store include Hogwarts uniform in house colours, for which the price of a cardigan is £59.99, although they are made of cashmere. Other collectibles to buy include Quidditch kits, Hogwarts robes, collectible train tickets, the Triwizard Quidditch Cup and Horcruxes. A large range of Harry Potter merchandise is also available, including board games, posters, key rings, soft toys and action figures.

Bring the books to life by visiting this quaint shop for a free magical Harry Potter experience that can be enjoyed by both children and the inner child in adult fans of the Harry Potter series. With easy access being located at Kings Cross Station, a visit to the magical Harry Potter Shop at Platform 9 3/4 is only a train ride away for a ‘not to be missed’ experience.

Expedia Mobile App Improves Booking Simplicity

By on 2012
Story posted under news and tagged , , , , , , , .

Expedia Mobile AppExpedia has long been renowned as a major operator in the travel industry, with millions of customers using its site every year to plan and book holidays, hotels, flights and more. Since online activity is beginning to turn away from laptop and desktop computers to mobile devices such as smart phones and tablets, users have been crying out for Expedia to update its mobile app, which could formerly only be used to book hotels.

That update has arrived, and with it the opportunity to simply book flights around the world. The app isn’t a direct translation of the usual web site, but instead a streamlined

Expedia Mobile App

version that meets the expectations of mobile users.

Search flights simply

Flights can easily be searched by a number of options including price, departure time, arrival time and duration, giving users complete control over their travel experience. The app currently searches over 200 airlines in order to find you the best rates, so you can be confident that you’ve found the best deal available.

Exclusive offers

If you think that using your laptop to book that flight is still more convenient consider this: the mobile app offers exclusive discounts that can’t be found on the desktop site. These aren’t trivial discounts – as much as 60% off their 140,000 hotels is up for grabs direct from the launch screen. With 5 million people having already downloaded the app, such a tempting discount is likely to lead to even higher download rates.

Further updates

The updated app doesn’t just making finding and booking cheap flights easy; it also improves upon its existing features. Booking a room at one of more than the 140,000 searchable hotels is now better than ever thanks to improved images that give customers a clearer picture of what they can expect upon check-in. If that’s not enough user reviews are still instantly accessible direct from the app, letting customers get a second opinion before deciding where to stay.Expedia Mobile App

Where from here?

Whether Expedia plans to release further updates to incorporate more features from its desktop site such as car hire is unclear. While offering further features might be one way to separate itself from the competition and entice more users to download the app, it would also risk complicating what is currently a very balanced, simple to use interface. They have also integrated the ability to earn Expedia Rewards direct from the mobile app which will start to compete head-to-head with airlines frequent flyer programs.

The Expedia App supports mobile devices running iOS and Android and is free to download at www.expedia.com/app. It is currently unavailable to Windows Phone users. You also need to check if all the features are available in your country as the flight booking element is not yet available in the UK at this point.

Expedia Mobile Devices

Expedia turns focus towards Viator Tours

By on 2012
Story posted under news and tagged , , , , .

Local ExpertAfter fifteen years in the online travel industry, Expedia is turning its focus onto the ancillary product sector – an industry currently championed by Viator. The ancillary product market, which includes holiday tours and activities, is estimated to be worth $27 billion.

Thus far, Expedia has involved itself in the accommodation and air travel industries, recently completing a major migration to bring its technology up to date. While in the past, Expedia has been involved with day tours, offering 7,600 experiences to its customers across the world, the company hopes to offer multi-day products too.

Local Features

Their core local products offered are:

  • Local Experiences Exchange – white label white with your branding
  • Local Access – access to their point of sale software
  • Local Custom Link – service your online customers via seamless API
  • Local Expert – experienced in-house concierge services for your customers

Using its new Local Expert Hub, Expedia will be able to provide tours and activities direct on its own website, as well as through its third party sites. Viator offers a similar service, with its 9,000 attractions, activities and tours in over 150 countries made available through viator.com as well as 24 additional websites. But with over 3 million visitors per month already choosing Viator, how will Expedia compete in this new environment?

With a decade an a half in the industry, Expedia already boasts its own far-reaching customer base. The company will provide a point-of-sale service on desktops or using kiosks and concierges. This “Direct Connect” API system will allow operators real-time access to Expedia’s systems and portfolio of trips, offering tailored experiences and itineraries.

Expedia’s previous vast involvement in the travel industry also provides distinct cross-selling advantages, allowing accommodation and air customers to invest in tours and activities at the time of booking.

The company believes that by offering ancillary services as package activities while customers are booking a hotel room or flight, it will be granted a great opportunity to market its new products to people who have not yet made any arrangements. This will provide guests with the option to create a truly personalised trip in a single sitting. Holiday-makers will also be able to book tours and activities individually, using a separate website.

Expedia Local Tours Global Reach

Additionally, during the recent technology overhaul the company has optimised its web content, making information readily accessible through all mobile devices such as smart-phones and tablet computers.

KAYAK snapped up by Priceline.com

By on 2012
Story posted under news and tagged , , , , .

KAYAKKAYAK, the online travel website, has been bought by the travel company Priceline just months after KAYAK went public.

Founded in 2004 by co-founders of some of the biggest travel agencies – Expedia, Orbitz and Travelocity, KAYAK is a travel search engine and online travel agency that indexes hundreds of global travel sites to help the user find the best deal.

KAYAK is a fast growing company – it had more than a billion queries within the first ten months of 2012, with more than twenty million downloads of its mobile app, making it the #1 travel app.  So it is not very surprising that the travel website Priceline was keen to snap it up, less than four months after KAYAK publicly launched, for $1.8 billion.

One of the keys to KAYAK’s success is the fact that users are kept on the website – as well as searching for travel options, they can also book everything without being redirected to third-party sites. This means that users are much more likely to finish their transaction, which in turn means success for KAYAK and for the third-party sites too.

Kayak Travel

As well as flights, hotel bookings are starting to make up a large part of KAYAK’s revenue, which might explain why the company caught Priceline’s eye. Priceline works with over 245,000 properties, and the merger will be that Priceline will help expand the hotel side of KAYAK’s business.

Paul English, one of KAYAK’s co-founders, cites KAYAK’s dedicated customer service as the reason for its success. English says that KAYAK responds individually to every email they receive from a customer, and the email comes directly for one of their engineers, not from an outsourced support company.

Financially KAYAK is booming. Its results for Q2 of 2012 bettered Wall Street and even its own projections, reporting almost $77 million in revenue, a massive hike of 36% year on year from its Q2 2011 sales.

Online Travel Agencies are a flourishing market. The popularity of travel sites and apps like Tripology, Mobissimo and SkyScanner is growing rapidly, and it won’t be long until we see more company mergers like Priceline and KAYAK.

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