TravelMail hits big...so far

It was not without some trepidation that I ventured into the private lair of the Daily Mail on Tuesday night to celebrate the official launch of the paper's travel website, TravelMail.

As many readers will know, the Daily Mail was mildly perturbed when Travolution spoiled the fanfare by publishing screen shots of the site days before the "official" launch party.

A bit naughty??? Perhaps. But come on folks, the Mail is not exactly known for holding fire when handed a golden opportunity to scupper someone's else plans.

(Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.)

Whatever your views on the "voice of Middle England" tabloid, the guys and gals responsible for TravelMail deserve a pat on the back.

The site is well designed and user-friendly, and, as of Tuesday evening, had attracted 7,000 visitors.

(Not too shabby for its first full day of operations.)

I have yet to find any major flaws with the TravelMail site itself, but I do question why the link doesn't hold a more prominent place on the Daily Mail homepage.

All in all, it was worth attending the party and, thankfully, the Daily Mail folk were quite sporting about getting scooped on one of their biggest stories of the year.

But the best part of the night came when I won a case of Dom Perignon. (Yep, an entire case.)

I would've been happy with a couple of glasses of the cheap stuff they were pouring at the party (well, cheap by comparison) , but I'm not complaining.

And just so no one can accuse me of accepting bribes, I've already informed Travolution's editor, Kevin May and TravelMail publisher, Toby Kesterton that I have nothing but charitable intentions (honest).

Tricia Holly Davis, chief writer, Travolution

Technorati tags: daily mail associated newspapers travel portal travelmail

EXCLUSIVE - TravelMail screen shots they don't want you to see just yet

[UPDATES at the bottom]

Much fun to be had today...

Within a few hours of the previous post, about the launch of TravelMail.co.uk, a cheeky reader from the tech department of a tour operator emailed us with some links into the site - which are live!

We don't want to ruin the party next week, of course, so readers will have to fathom it out themselves - but here are some screen grabs from around the site.





UPDATE: We've already had a call from Associated Newspapers asking who is our source. You've got to laugh at the irony of it all...

UPDATE 2: Associated has started pulling down some of the main pages of the site - such as the homepage - and replacing them with the holding page.

Kevin May, editor, Travolution

Technorati tags: daily mail associated newspapers travel portal travelmail

To hell with it...let's wait for the party

Last week we discovered - and had the nod from officials - that delays to the long-awaited launch of TravelMail were finally over and users would be able to be see the site on May 9.

The excitement at Travolution Towers on Wednesday morning was almost too much to bear, such has been our level of interest in what is essentially a huge online travel project for one of the biggest newspaper groups in the UK.

But, alas, we were greeted with a holding page - "will launch in Spring 2007" - after we eagerly typed in the URL.

"I suppose it's better than the old re-direct to ThisIsTravel.co.uk," someone muttered as they trudged off to make a cup of tea.

Those wags at the Daily Mail certainly know how to keep an audience waiting - another six days, in fact.

According to someone at the PR company - our collection of usually reliable sources were mysteriously tight lipped yesterday, so we had to go elsewhere - the site will now be unveiled on Tuesday 15 May, to coincide with the glitzy launch party in London.

Er, okay...

"It is not a delay," we were informed quickly. Let's hope not...

UPDATE: Exclusive but unwanted access and screen shots

Kevin May, editor, Travolution

Technorati tags: daily mail associated newspapers travel portal travelmail