- Flight Centre Travel Group has announced an annual profit growth of 0.1 per cent to $263.8 million
- The strong growth came from overseas, with the American business delivering a 44 per cent pre-tax growth
- Flight Centre will close up to 30 stores across Australia, and another 30 Flight Centre stores will be rebranded to Travel Associated and Universal Traveller
Flight Centre Travel Group has announced an annual profit growth of 0.1 per cent to $263.8 million.
The increase in profit came mainly from overseas, with the company’s American business delivering a 44 per cent pre-tax growth, with an excess of $100 million.
“The American corporate business has just overtaken its Australia-New Zealand counterpart to become our largest corporate business globally,” Managing Director Graham Turner said.
Due to domestic operations not doing so well, Flight Centre generated more than half of its profit from offshore, for the first time in its history.
It will close up to 30 stores across Australia, and another 30 Flight Centre stores will be rebranded to Travel Associated and Universal Traveller.
About 30- 40 leisure shops will be relocated to better sites.
“There are, of course, challenges to overcome within the Australian leisure business, which remains very important to us despite the emergence of other businesses that are capable of driving overall growth,” Graham added.
Flight Centre is Australia’s biggest travel agency and aims to provide customers with their dream holiday.
The company now has a solid corporate travel footprint and a platform to further grow in Europe, with start ups and acquisitions in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Ireland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland.
Overseas businesses have become strong and consistent performers for the company and Flight Centre believes this will continue.
“We expect this trend to continue, given our success and relatively small share of very large markets overseas,” Graham said.
Flight Centre plans on improving Australia’s operational performances and simplifying the product-to-market approach.
Around 200 new sales consultants have been added to the Flight Centre Brand throughout this year, to ensure shops are appropriately staffed and to return to optimum staffing levels (5,200 people), which was reduced in the recent months.
Universal Traveller’s launch in Australia this month, as well as StudentUniverse’s introduction signifies the company’s push into the youth sector.
The company plans to release its FY20 guidance at its Annual General Meeting in November.
Flight Centre has gained 9.81 per cent on the ASX today and is currently selling shares at $48.14 per share.