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'New' Ski Travel Biz vs. 'Old School,' New Wins

By J.D. O'Connor
September 04, 2006

If you're looking for a clearcut example of how the ski travel industry is shifting from the brochure browsing "old school" market to a more Web savvy clientele, look no further than Directski.com in Dublin, Ireland.

Directski president Anthony Collins, 35, started the Euro-centric ski travel firm six years ago, with a little financial help from his father Tony - himself in the travel biz and owner/operator of Topflight. Directski fills the seats on 40 routes a week from seven airports in Ireland and Britain to ten ski destinations across Europe, and has recently added a new route between Edinburgh and Geneva.

Both companies went their merry way - Anthony focusing on the younger, techno-centric ski set while father Tony continued serving the older, more staid demographic. Things went so well for Directski that it recently acquired McNeill Rigby Travel of Belfast, a move Anthony Collins predicted would bring in revenue of Euro 40 million this year ($51,300,000 US) - a tidy sum compared to the Euro 2 million ($2,500,000 US) investment 'da' Collins made in 2000.

Irish pundits predicted some "interesting" dinnertime conversation in the Collins household in the weeks to come, but Anthony Collins insists family relations are intact despite his recent success.

"Directski doesn't compete that much with Topflight because so much of our business comes from the UK," he told a hometown newspaper. "But I'm sure that, on a selfish level, he (Dad) wishes Topflight was getting all the business."

As Directski's biggest shareholder, the elder Collins was not exactly left out in the cold. Still, he can only respect the growth and direction his son's enterprise has taken since he helped start Directski, which boasted 16,000 customers during the 2005/06 ski season - up from 9,000 clients the prior year.

Collins had expected to carry 27,000 people in 2006/07, with a projected revenue of Euro 20 million ($25,000,000 US). The McNeill Rigby acquisition will double that figure, he said. Directski will keep McNeill Rigby's "brick and mortar" locations and employee base intact, Collins said, but convert its "more mundane" operations to an online format - a formula which has worked well so far.

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