SkyDeals: the flight shop that united every fare type in six months

The client

SkyDeals.co.uk was a Thomson Travel Group venture to build the ultimate flight shop for the web: one destination for chartered, scheduled and low-cost flights, with online booking, a call centre and fulfilment wired together. The live portfolio listing once tagged the client as "Sky"; the work was for SkyDeals, part of Thomson, not BSkyB.

John Stevens (RCA) art directed the web design and development. We delivered as the design team at NetDecisions / Agilisys.

The challenge

The web had become the default channel for airline tickets, but the market was split: airlines selling direct, heavy online travel agents, and new low-cost carriers each with their own sites. No single shop offered the full spectrum with a coherent customer experience. Thomson wanted the next-generation flight shop: strategy, brand, technology and operations, not a skin on one feed.

What we did

Web design and development under John Stevens' art direction, as part of a netdecisions engagement that modelled the best possible customer experience, created the SkyDeals brand, and integrated online booking, call centre and fulfilment. The agency delivered a new flight engine in six months using XML and Java, tying together Worldspan's central reservation system, discounted flight data, chartered flight systems and links to low-cost carriers.

Our approach

Look beyond the web. The proposition was a complete customer offering: clean design, fast booking, and back-office integration so Thomson could sell the full range without forcing customers to compare fares across half the internet. Technology independence mattered as much as the UI.

Outcome

A unified flight shop for an era when most competitors still specialised in one fare type. SkyDeals sat alongside TheFirstResort.com and Britannia Direct in netdecisions' Thomson Travel portfolio, evidence of repeated delivery for the group across holidays and flights.

Context & coverage

Low-cost carriers were rewriting UK travel economics in 2000. Thomson's response was not to pick one model but to aggregate them under a new brand with serious integration behind the search box. NetDecisions' July 2000 brochure positions SkyDeals as pioneering XML/Java flight commerce at speed.

• NetDecisions press release summary, July 2000: SkyDeals Challenge/Solution, six-month flight engine, Worldspan, low-cost links (ingested primary source).