Obituary: ‘It was no holiday’ – the life and times of package travel trailblazer Jim Preston

It started with a week-long coach trip to Ostend that cost £16, for 30 people.

By the time founder Jim Preston left Lyons Tours in 1972 – having sold it in 1966 – the operator was taking holidaymakers by air to the likes of Ibiza, Majorca, the Costa Brava and even Tunisia.

Along the way, there were plenty of profits and champagne – but also two fatal plane crashes and a great deal of stress with a heavy workload and legal wranglings.

Jim has died at the age of 93 after a long illness but his life and times are recounted his book of memoirs, called It Was No Holiday, which gives a fascinating account of the early days of mass tourism.

He left school aged 14 on a Friday and started at the Colne Co-operative on the following Monday, working as a grocer’s assistant on 17s 6d a week (87 ½ pence in today’s money).

Turning 18, he was called up for his two-year National Service, serving with the army in Hanover, Germany, for 18 months.

His clerical experience meant that when he returned to the Co-op, he soon moved to the excursion department – which was an agent for early tour operators such as Wallace Arnold and Thomas Cook. The department also sold coach tours in the UK and one overseas, to Paris.

In 1954 Jim won a place on a “life-changing” six-week trip to the Caribbean, with his union granting him £100 to cover his salary while he was visiting Bermuda, Trinidad, Guyana, Barbados, Antigua, Martinique and Jamaica.

Back at the excursion department on £8 a week, he was inspired to organise a coach tour holiday to Ostend – even though he had never visited the Belgian port.

He and girlfriend Sheila Lyons wrote to the Belgian tourist office for a list of hotels and prices. They then wrote to Hotel Chequers on headed notepaper: “S Lyons, Tour Operator, Station Garage, Colne, Lancashire” – the address of Sheila’s father.

“I had £3. It cost half that sum to have 100 letterheads printed in Colne and the remainder for the paper to hand-duplicate 100 itineraries on the Colne parish church duplicator,” he recalled.

They advertised in the local paper for the tour – costing £16 per head – and visited customers to collect the cash.

He chose the excursions from the brochures of other operators such as Thomas Cook, Global, Blue Cars, Polytechnic and Lumbs of Halifax.

The trip generated a net profit of £120. “I was rich. I was astounded,” recalled Jim.

In 1956, they added Lech in Austria and produced a brochure, copies of which were sent to 200 travel agents across the country, offering 7.5% commission.

He left his job at the Co-op to focus on the business, dealing with bookings and typing out confirmations.

Couriers were recruited on a salary of £13 a week then in December 1956, he took on his first employee.

Business was so strong that he paid off his £1,850 mortgage.

For the 1959 season they expanded to nine tours, adding Swiss, German and Spanish destinations.

Holidays by air started in 1962 – taking passengers from Euston by coach to Southend Airport.

Jim also worked at an agency – Lewis’s Travel Bureau – on Saturdays in the peak selling season of January and February.

By 1963 there were air tours to the Costa Brava using flights from Gatwick to Perpignan, and the company joined Abta.

The lead-in price for a 12-day full-board Costa Brava holiday was £33 10s.

Tragically that year, one of the flights crashed during a storm in the Pyrenees, killing 40 passengers. In 1969, there was a second plane crash, again in the Pyrenees.

In 1966, the company produced its first colour brochure – 72 pages and a two-million print run.

They took 74,000 passengers away – but realised the company needed bigger premises and a computer.

Costing £60,000, the new computer took up an entire room and had to be air-conditioned.

He sold Lyons Tours in 1966 to Air Holdings as stress was taking its toll on his health but stayed on as managing director until 1972.

His memoirs recall the annual Abta convention, which took place in Torquay one year.

“We had our own dinner party for 200 agents. Gracie Fields entertained us at a cost of £2,000,” he wrote.

“We had tried for Shirley Bassey but were not able to afford her £5,000.”

After retiring from the company aged 42, he moved into buying and selling property in Spain.

The final Lyons brochure was in 1972 and the company, under new management, became Castle Holidays but closed three years later.

“I have only made two decisions in my life with impeccable timing. One was to commence the business of Lyons Tours in 1955 when overseas travel was in its infancy,” he wrote.

“The other was to sell the business in 1966 to Air Holdings when travel was booming but becoming increasingly competitive.”

He leaves behind his second wife Marylyn, his son, daughter-in-law and granddaughter.

Marylyn said: “He was a true gentleman and will be a big loss to his family and friends.”