TUI Travel - A Giant Of The European Travel Industry
TUI AG (Touristik Union International) is a large international company based in Germany. The well known TUI ‘smile’ logo is used to represent a number of companies including the popular UK tour operator Thomson Holidays. The recently formed TUI Travel PLC was created through the merger of First Choice Holidays PLC and the tourism division of TUI AG. TUI Travel consists of over 80 Tour Operators in countries all over Europe, and has around 155 aircraft. In addition TUI AG also has a number of airlines, Cruise ships, retail stores, and container ships.
There are approximately 3,600 travel retail outlets in the TUI group and over one hundred TUI AG owned airlines serving 180 destinations worldwide, making TUI the largest holiday fleet in Europe. TUI Hotels and Resorts is also the biggest hotelier in Europe and owns 12 holiday brands in 30 countries. Altogether TUI Hotels and Resorts consists of around 285 hotels and over 160,000 beds. TUI acquired the Hapag-Lloyd shipping company in 1998 and is one of the largest shipping companies in the world.