At the beginning of the Victorian era, a visionary man invented an industry built around discovery, adventure, the mixing of cultures and, above all, dreams. Thomas Cook is regarded as the world’s first tour operator, orchestrating a group holiday as early as 1841. Portrait of Thomas Cook.
Nothing could have foreshadowed such a destiny. Born in Melbourne in the United Kingdom in 1808, little Thomas Cook began working in a market at the age of 10, before working in a cabinetmaker’s workshop until he was in his twenties while helping his mother in her shop. In 1841, at the age of 33 and a former evangelist missionary, he organised his very first trip from Leicester to Loughborough, a distance of around 20 kilometres, on the occasion of an anti-alcohol conference. Alcohol was a veritable scourge in the United Kingdom at the time. Thomas Cook managed to persuade the Midland Railway to charter a train for the event, asking the 570 people to pay for a ticket that included the journey and a meal. Without any experience, without even really knowing it, Thomas Cook had orchestrated the very first group trip and launched an unprecedented tourist empire.
More and more destinations
Building on this success, he planned an excursion to Liverpool for 1,200 customers in 1845. They were entitled to several stops in Wales, to visit the region’s castles and mountains. As an added bonus, Thomas Cook published a travel brochure with important directions and itinerary information. It’s a first!
In the same spirit, the entrepreneur launched the first travel magazine, The Excursionist, in 1851. Four years later, a hotel was even built under his aegis in Leicester.
In 1855, the first foreign tour was organised in Europe, in Belgium, Germany and France, from Strasbourg to Paris. The company even offered a complete travel package, including travel, accommodation and food. An all-inclusive formula that is still popular today. In 1863, Thomas Cook further developed its business and offers in Paris by negotiating a special rate with the Compagnie des chemins de fer de l’Ouest. Customers were offered a new travel package.
Travelling the world
In 1869, the travel agent unveiled the first Nile cruise, followed by excursions to Australia, India, America and Palestine over the years. In 1872, Thomas Cook revealed his round-the-world trip in 222 days. If holidays were already reserved for the wealthy, this round-the-world trip could only have delighted a handful of travellers. ‘When Jules Verne published his Around the World in 80 Days in 1872, the English read the account of Thomas Cook’s real voyage in the Times…’ write journalists Béatrix de l’Aulnoit and Philippe Alexandre in their book Thomas Cook, 1808-1892, L’inventeur des voyages, published by Robert Laffont in 2018.
A few years later, ‘international hotel vouchers’ were offered, thanks to relationships between the company and hotels. The forerunner of holiday vouchers. Thomas Cook, which had already opened several agencies, observed the world, analysed the differences in tourism between countries, formed partnerships to help its business prosper and, above all, continued to democratise travel for all. International customers and the press praised his idyllic and innovative holidays, which revolutionised leisure time.
When he died in 1892, his empire was left in the hands of his family, his son and three grandchildren. Like the founder, the offspring rivalled each other in travel inventiveness, between technological advances and entertaining activities. In 1919, the company became the first to offer air travel.
In 1928, the family sold the company to the Compagnie belge des wagons-lits et des grands express européens. The company was sold several times before being acquired in 2001 by the German tourism group C&N Touristik AG. Thomas Cook Group was then renamed Thomas Cook AG. In 2019, the company announced its bankruptcy, disrupted by a badly handled merger, debt that was difficult to repay, the internet boom in holiday booking, Brexit-related uncertainties and having failed to secure significant financial aid. The end of a beautiful journey.
After coming to a complete halt during the health crisis, the tourism industry is beginning to return to pre-pandemic levels. By the end of 2024, the recovery should even be complete, and growth could be up by +2% compared with 2019, when destinations generated 1,500 billion dollars, according to the World Tourism Organisation.
Read also > The short history… of the bikini
Front page photo: © DR
