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NEW Summer 2024 Holidays & Day Excursions Brochures out NOW!

Date Added 10/10/2023

We are delighted to announce we have 3 brand new fantastic brochures coming your way very soon! General Bookings for our new Summer 2024 Holidays, Great Breaks, Day Excursions and Express Excursion open 19th October at 9am! There are plenty of fantastic days out to choose from, some that have returned from last year and some brand new ones! We asked our Tours Manager, Barry Cobb to introduce them to you ...

“The research and planning that goes into a Summer Brochure is a continuous process, one that involves blending the new with the old; looking at what elements of previous tours have been popular, whether this has been the actual hotel or the excursions and seeing if changes need to be made. We do this by listening to our customers, examining their feedback on Feefo and by also constantly reading the reports by our ‘troops on the ground’ - our Drivers and Couriers – This is why your feedback is so important.

Certainly, there are many hotels we feature that we describe as our most ‘ Popular Favourites’ – These are hotels we have used for many years, where traditionally the high levels of service and attention they offer our customers have been assured. However, we are well aware that circumstances may change, so we never rest on our laurels and constantly monitor all elements of the tour to ensure the ‘Johnson’s Standard’ is maintained. Whilst all this is going on, our team are also constantly looking at new excursion opportunities and for potential new hotel partnerships – hotels, that we feel will understand the Johnsons expectation and will complement and enhance our product offering.

2023 has been a very busy and successful season and has more-or-less seen us return to pre-pandemic passenger numbers. This has enabled us to re-invest and increase the size of our in-house ‘ Own Products Touring Fleet’. We will increase the number of ‘Luxury Traveller’ coaches next April to FIVE . This will allow us to operate almost 55% of our coach holidays in 2024 with these popular vehicles that were first introduced in 2021. However, and equally important, we are also pleased to announce that two brand new 49-seat ‘Club Class’ coaches – the mainstay of the Johnsons touring fleet for years - will arrive in the Spring of 2024 and will reduce the average age of our touring fleet to THREE years! – which given we almost lost a full 12 month trading period due to the pandemic, is something we are very proud of.

Our Summer 2024 brochure is brimming with over 250 departures between March and October. This includes almost 60 ‘Luxury Traveller’ departures and a further 76 departures that will have their vehicles upgraded to the ‘Luxury Traveller’ standard – We are also pleased to announce that in 2024 - COMPLIMENTARY ON-BOARD DRINKS will now be provided on ALL TOURS ALLOCATED TO ONE OF OUR ‘LUXURY TRAVELLER’ COACHES! Also new to the ‘Luxury Traveller’ collection in 2024 are a series of ‘EXPERIENCE TOURS’ where we invite you to share in local stories and meet the owners and innovators by joining our exclusive access tours which differentiate us from the rest.

Once again, we are delighted to feature over 20 departures to our friends at BREND HOTELS – The West Country’s leading hotel group – a name that is synonymous with traditional elegance, wonderful cuisine and outstanding service – all attributes that are vitally important to you, our loyal customer and are vitally important to the Johnson’s brand. The same can be said about another of the West Country’s leading hotel group – The Grose Faily and we are again delighted to feature departures to their hotels at Mullion Cove and Thurlestone in South Devon (with the latter being a personal favourite of mine! Possibly a weighty expectation to bear… but they always do seem to deliver!)

Holidays within the UK are still very popular, especially within the normal demographic of our core customer base, so we have an extensive selection of holidays not only to the majority of England’s prime coastal destinations, but also to the many other scenic countryside locations that make up our ‘green and pleasant land’. Over the years I have travelled extensively throughout the UK, Ireland and the Continent and two of my own personal favourite countries to visit are Scotland and Ireland. I love the diversity of scenery, culture and heritage these regions offer and believe that in 2024 we have our finest ever offering of holidays to these Celtic shores. We have 28 separate departures planned to locations ‘North of the Border’ to Scotland and our Irish offering has now increased to 9 different locations – Testament to the recent popularity and demand we have seen for these two countries.

It was particularly pleasing to see our coaches returning to Continental Europe in significant numbers again in 2023 and with confidence now more-or-less back to normal we are pleased to offer an increased programme of holidays to mainland Europe. Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Italy, France, Belgium and Holland are all well featured but one new destination we are so pleased to include for the first time in over a decade is a fantastic 10-night tour to Norway’s magnificent Lakeland Region – Watch out for this one, I believe it will be extremely popular.

Another new tour is our ‘big ticket’ 15 night ‘Treasures of Turkey’ tour. This is a fully inclusive tour, travelling by Air and local coach whilst in Turkey. Everything is included in this one, so whilst it may look a tad expensive, the tour includes your flights, 15 nights accommodation, 15 breakfasts, 14 lunches and 15 dinners, all your sightseeing excursions and entrance fees. Therefore we feel for the quality of product on offer this unique holiday opportunity represents excellent value for money.

In recent years we are aware that the popularity of ‘Cruise’ based holidays seems to know no bounds and for those of you who ‘love a cruise’ we offer not only a superb 8-night Seine River Cruise departing and returning to Paris but also another fantastic selection of Cruise Holidays with our preferred cruise partner ‘Fred Olsen’ – We have 10 wonderful cruises with varying durations. So, whether it be a cruise around the British Isles, Iceland, the Norwegian Fjords, the Azores & Madeira or our amazing 28-night Island Hopping Cruise to the Caribbean, we are sure there will be something just right for you. Also please remember that on all our Fred Olsen Cruises we take care of all your gratuities, so there are no hidden and unexpected extras to pay.

Remember Johnsons are your local family firm with 114 years of experience and with over 40 years of Coach Holiday involvement and know-how which we believe sets us apart from the rest.

Enjoy browsing, and I’m sure that there will be something that is just right for you, and we look forward to welcoming you on board soon."