Travelocity and Lonely Planet join forces for the ultimate travel website

MARCH 11, 2003 | LONDON, UK
Travelocity Europe, part of leading online travel company Travelocity.com, has signed a three-year deal with Lonely Planet to license their travel content.

The pan-European deal includes multi-lingual destination information and covers all major tourist destinations, regions, islands, major cities and far-flung locations around the globe. Each destination is brought to life with maps and high quality photographs, supplied by Lonely Planet Images.

Travelocity recently redesigned their UK and German sites to better meet the needs of their target audience, following extensive consumer usability research, strategic development and brand positioning. Lonely Planet was selected as Travelocity's lead content provider across Europe due to its globally recognised brand and proven expertise in providing customised travel content across print, digital and online media.

Jamie Cole, vice-president partner marketing, Travelocity, who spearheaded the deal said: "This partnership with Lonely Planet strengthens Travelocity's position as a powerhouse in the European travel industry and follows similar successful partnerships formed in 2002, with leading players such as AOL Europe and Holiday Autos.

Cole continued: "The deal shows our determination to ensure the content on Travelocity's European websites mirror our customers' needs. We are thrilled to be able to offer our customers practical information on favourite destinations in an aspirational style."

Travelocity and Lonely Planet join forces for the ultimate travel website Lisa Oliver, UK business development manager, Lonely Planet said: "The partnership addresses the need for online travel companies to use destination content to drive bookings. Lonely Planet develops its products around the travel cycle to ensure customers are receiving the most relevant information at each stage."

Lonely Planet guides will be active on Travelocity.co.uk from 17 March, 2003. Visitors to the site will be able to click on a 'Guides' tab on the homepage which will take them through to a dual branded page, where they can click on their chosen destination to access the guide they require.

Notes to Editors:
To be inspired go to Travelocity's new look web site at www.travelocity.co.uk

About Lonely Planet
Lonely Planet is the world's most successful independent travel media company with offices in Australia, the US, UK and France. An established industry leader in customised travel information products, the company currently services over 50 corporate partners worldwide including Nokia, Fosters and The F.A. Lonely Planet is the UK's #1 guidebook publisher (Nielsen BookScan Total Consumer Market Top 5,000 Travel Titles, 2002) and Lonely Planet Australia is the best-selling guidebook in Britain.

About Travelocity
Travelocity.co.uk is one of the UK's top online travel agencies and was recently named best travel website at the British Travel Awards 2002. Travelocity.co.uk is part of Travelocity Europe, a leading multi-channel travel company offering a wide range of services via the internet, retail outlets and the telephone. On and offline business has been contributed by equal partners Travelocity, one of the world's leading online travel companies, and the Otto trade group, the global leaders in direct marketing. Companies currently under the Travelocity umbrella include Travelocity.co.uk in the UK, Travelocity.de and Travel Overland in Germany and Resfeber Scandinavia in Denmark, Sweden and Norway. There are aggressive expansion plans for the rest of Europe. Travelocity Europe provides travel information for over 700 airlines, over 50,000 hotels, over 50 car hire companies and over 1 million holiday packages. The company is based in Munich, Germany.

For more information contact:
Mel Capper, Lonely Planet publicist
ph: 020 7428 4805
email: Melanie.capper@lonelyplanet.co.uk