Flight Centre Travel Group has reportedly shifted several Infinity Holidays roles to New Zealand, with a number of the Australian team having left the company since August 2024.
According to Travel Weekly sources, Flight Centre Group shut down Infinity Travel’s hotel API business a couple of weeks ago with a number of roles impacted.
The wholesaler’s Australian team was reportedly shrunk after the company didn’t reach a $250 million turnover target set for its first year of business since rebranding to Infinity Travel. Turnover was reportedly closer to $100,000,000 in the first 12 months.
General manager James Whiting was made redundant in December last year. Three other members of staff including Teena Hollwey (account manager), Megan Lowe (business leader) and Clea de la Nougerede (marketing manager) have either left the company or been made redundant since August last year.
Lowe is now head of partnerships ANZ at Intrepid Travel and de la Nougerede has left the travel industry and is head of marketing at Big Ass Fans.
Travel Weekly is not implying that the departure of Lowe, Hollwey or de la Nougerede is related to the recent shutting down of the hotel API business.
Director of sales Kevin Looney and Les Nelson are still currently with Infinity Travel brand which is still operating, however, several sources have claimed that Looney is soon to depart Infinity.
According to sources, the bulk of the business operations have been transferred to New Zealand, with a small number of staff kept on long-term in Australia.
The news comes just over a year after Flight Centre Group decided to rebrand The Travel Junction to Infinity Holidays in September 2023. The Infinity Brand was initially dropped in 2020 during the pandemic, however, it was picked up again as it had strong brand recognition with Australian agents and the Infinity Holidays name is also registered globally.
In a statement to Travel Weekly, Flight Centre said: “The recent wind-down of our hotel API business is isolated and does not impact the broader Infinity Holidays business, which remains operational.”
“Flight Centre Travel Group continues to invest in Infinity Holidays and last year merged its Australian and New Zealand businesses. By streamlining and focusing on its co-consulting model the business is now positioned to offer better, more personalised support to agents and while providing better value to suppliers. ”
“Jo Rendall was appointed as the Infinity Holidays Business Leader in August 2024 and manages a team of 30 split across offices in Australia and New Zealand. Since the merge, the business continues to grow and there are plans to further expand its product offering while delivering best-in-class support to travel agents.”
