Cheap Tickets closing operations in Hawai'i
By Kelly Yamanouchi
Advertiser Staff Writer
About 200 employees of Honolulu-born Cheap Tickets Inc. will lose their jobs by the end of this year as the national company closes its Hawai'i travel sales operations.
Employees were notified yesterday of the company's plans to close the call center in the Pacific Guardian Tower on Kapi'olani Boulevard, the last remaining Cheap Tickets office in the Islands.
All Cheap Tickets employees in Hawai'i, including reservation agents and Internet customer care employees, will lose their jobs. Most employees will be terminated Nov. 26, and others will work until late December.
The travel business, founded in Hawai'i 17 years ago by husband-wife team Michael and Sandra Hartley, was sold to New York-based conglomerate Cendant Corp. in 2001 as the travel industry consolidated in response to growing Internet influence. Cheap Tickets is now headquartered in New Jersey.
Cheap Tickets continued to handle some of its phone reservations in Hawai'i, but more online travel bookings have reduced the need for call centers, said company spokeswoman Kate Sullivan. "There's just a huge growth in consumers making purchases online," she said.
Cheap Tickets is keeping open its primary call center operations in Denver.
"Since we've had our history in Honolulu, it's definitely been a difficult decision for us to make," Sullivan said. "We are still operating in a really tough travel environment and a difficult economy. It's really important for us to try to realize as many business efficiencies as possible."
Mayumi Fulkerson, 35, a reservations agent who has worked a year for Cheap Tickets, found out yesterday she would lose her job in two weeks. She's worried about finding other work.
"For all of us to go out and find something that we're all qualified for is going to be very hard for everybody," Fulkerson said. "More people now are going to be suffering financially and emotionally."
The company is helping employees prepare resumes and find work through Cendant or other employers, Sullivan said. Cendant also owns time-share company Fairfield Resorts Inc., which has operations in Hawai'i.
Employees will receive standard severance packages, she said.
The Hartleys founded Cheap Tickets in 1986 using personal savings. A year later, they offered a toll-free telephone service.
The company grew dramatically into a major retailer of discount airline tickets, and was one of Hawai'i's business success stories.
In 1997, it launched an e-commerce site, then went public two years later, selling shares of stock for $15. Within five months, the stock price climbed to $60 as the company rode the Internet bubble.
But like many companies with Internet-based operations, Cheap Tickets soon saw a decline in profits and closed most of its walk-in stores.
Cendant acquired the company for $280 million in 2001, when it employed about 440 workers in Hawai'i. Cendant's Travel Distribution division, which includes Cheap Tickets, has about 5,000 employees.
Michael Hartley, 54, said he and his wife were sad to hear the company they had started would be leaving Hawai'i for good.
"It's just due to the fact that the travel business has become a very low-margin business, and call centers are very expensive to operate," said Hartley, who now runs The Hartley Foundation, a nonprofit charity.
His thoughts, he said, are with the employees.
"We're very sad to see that the last vestiges of Cheap Tickets, especially in the town it was founded in, is now going away.".
Reach Kelly Yamanouchi at 535-2470, or at kyamanouchi@honoluluadvertiser.com.
