An appeal to operators
We have been approached by the "new" Redletter Days company looking to strike a deal to passify the hoardes of disgruntled voucher holders .... oops, sorry ... to ensure the continued success of the strong brandname and to generate a 1000% increase in the amount of business put our way (am I starting to sound cynical ?) in the future.
(I make no excuses for the liberal use of "quotes", as this is a habit I have picked up from the "new" owners, and I have to say rather enjoy "it" !!)
Without going into the details of the deal in a public domain, suffice to say the deal involves both the new owners and the suppliers taking a 'hit' on vouchers sold before the demise of the "old" RLD firm.
This is an example of the "generous" nature of the new owners who, we are informed, are not obliged to accept any repsonsibility for vouchers sold prior to their purchase of RLD, so I guess we should count our lucky stars that we've been "invited" to demostrate our "generous" nature also.
I have spoken with one or two other operators to get feel for their interpretation of the deal, to see whether this is something we should get involved with, or whether we should tell them to stick it up their "new" Red-chuff, as without suppliers there is NO business !
We feel that
By agreeing to the deal we are:
Protecting our relationship with the "new" company; generating some revenue albeit that some experiences will be at cost; and helping to increase the vast personal wealth of the "new" owners and to resurrect the horse carcass that was RLD
By NOT agreeing to the deal:
We don't increase our exposure to the new company, but maybe jeopardising our relationship with them in future.
I would be very grateful to hear from other suppliers either here or via private message to ascertain what the general industry consensus is, with sepcific reference to:
i) would you go ahead with the deal or not ?
ii) do we club together to say NO to the deal and force their hand ?
iii) do we club together and get a single legal representative (any ideas FlyingLawyer ?) to chase the bad debt from the administrator ?
iv) do we agree to the deal but insist on better terms ?
v) do we roll over like puppy dogs and agree to everything because we're worried about losing the business ?
Naturally this is a sensitive topic, so any contact will be in strictest confidence but I think this is a prime opportunity for the industry to stick together and PPrune being the ideal forum for this discussion.
My thanks for your time.