CheapTickets

Last updated
CheapTickets
Company type Subsidiary
Industry Online travel services
Founded1986;38 years ago (1986) in Honolulu, Hawaii
FounderMichael J. Hartley
Sandra Hartley
Headquarters
Chicago, Illinois
,
United States
Key people
Parent Expedia Group
Website www.cheaptickets.com

CheapTickets is an online travel services company focusing on the leisure market, offering airline tickets, hotel and vacation rentals, rental cars, customized vacation packages, and cruises. CheapTickets was a wholly owned subsidiary of Orbitz Worldwide, Inc., and with Expedia Inc.'s purchase of Orbitz, it is now a subsidiary of Expedia Group.

Contents

History

CheapTickets was founded in 1986 in Honolulu, Hawaii by Michael and Sandra Hartley when inter-island carrier Mid Pacific Air gave 3,000 tickets to Hartley's employer at the time, advertising firm Regency Media, as payment for its services at the time Regency closed its Honolulu branch. The tickets were advertised via newspaper classified ads and sold out in two weeks. The company grew into an airline ticket consolidator, acquiring seats from airlines at rates low enough to allow the company to resell them at fares lower than the airline's normal published airfares. [1]

It opened its first call center in Honolulu in 1987, and would later open call centers in Colorado Springs, Colorado; Lakeport, California; Los Angeles, California; and Tampa, Florida. [2] It launched its web site in 1997, becoming a pioneer in Internet travel sales. [3] The company operated brick and mortar agency locations in Hawaii, California, New York, and Washington, which were closed by the end of 2003, by which time they accounted for 2 percent of the company's business. [1] [4]

The company was acquired in 2000 by Cendant. In July 2006, it was included, with the sale of Travelport to the Blackstone Group, as part of their Travel Distribution Services Division that later became Orbitz Worldwide, Inc. [5] [6]

In 2009, Orbitz was sued by the state of New Jersey for alleged violations of the state's Consumer Fraud Act relating to tickets offered for sale on CheapTickets Exchange for a Bruce Springsteen concert prior to the first public sale date. The company successfully claimed immunity under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, and Milgram v. Orbitz was dismissed. [7]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">ATA Airlines</span> Defunct airline of the United States (1973–2008)

ATA Airlines, Inc. – formerly known as American Trans Air and commonly referred to as ATA – was an American low-cost scheduled service and charter airline based in Indianapolis, Indiana. ATA operated scheduled passenger flights throughout the U.S. mainland and Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Portugal as well as military and commercial charter flights around the world. In its early days, the airline flew charters on a worldwide basis and had bases in Chicago, Detroit, New York, Indianapolis, Oakland, and Milwaukee. Later, when it entered scheduled service, the airline maintained focus cities at Chicago Midway International Airport, Honolulu International Airport, and Oakland International Airport.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hawaiian Airlines</span> American airline

Hawaiian Airlines is a commercial U.S. airline, headquartered at Honolulu, Hawaii. It is the largest operator of commercial flights to and from the island state of Hawaii, and the tenth-largest commercial airline in the United States.

Aloha Airlines was an airline in the United States that operated passenger flights from 1946 until 2008. It was headquartered in Honolulu, Hawaii, operating from its hub at Honolulu International Airport.

Expedia Inc. is an online travel agency owned by Expedia Group, based in Seattle. The website and mobile app can be used to book airline tickets, hotel reservations, car rentals, cruise ships, and vacation packages. Expedia.com was launched on October 22, 1996 by Microsoft.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Orbitz</span> Web-based travel fare aggregator service

Orbitz.com is a travel fare aggregator website and travel metasearch engine. The website is owned by Orbitz Worldwide, Inc., a subsidiary of Expedia Group. It is headquartered in the Citigroup Center, Chicago, Illinois.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cendant</span> Defunct American company

Cendant Corporation was an American provider of business and consumer services, primarily within the real estate and travel industries. In 2005 and 2006, it broke up and spun off or sold its constituent businesses. Although it was based in New York City, the majority of its headquarters employees were in Parsippany-Troy Hills, New Jersey.

Worldspan is a provider of travel technology and content and a part of the Travelport GDS business. It offers worldwide electronic distribution of travel information, Internet products and connectivity, and e-commerce capabilities for travel agencies, travel service providers and corporations. Its primary system is commonly known as a Global Distribution System (GDS), which is used by travel agents and travel related websites to book airline tickets, hotel rooms, rental cars, tour packages and associated products. Worldspan also hosts IT services and product solutions for major airlines.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Expedia Group</span> US online travel shopping company

Expedia Group, Inc. is an American travel technology company that owns and operates travel fare aggregators and travel metasearch engines, including Expedia, Hotels.com, Vrbo, Travelocity, Hotwire.com, Orbitz, Ebookers, CheapTickets, CarRentals.com, Expedia Cruises, Wotif, and Trivago. Over 3 million lodging facilities and flights on over 500 airlines are bookable on the company's websites. It has 16,500 employees, and its headquarters are located in Seattle, Washington.

The Bank of Hawaii Corporation is a regional commercial bank headquartered in Honolulu, Hawaii. It is Hawaii's second oldest bank and its largest locally owned bank in that the majority of the voting stockholders reside within the state. Bank of Hawaii has the most accounts, customers, branches, and ATMs of any financial institution in the state. The bank consists of four business segments: retail banking, commercial banking, investment services, and treasury. The bank is currently headed by chairman, president and chief executive officer, Peter S. Ho.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Payless Car Rental</span> American car rental brand

Payless Car Rental, Inc. is a car rental company owned by Avis Budget Group and headquartered in St. Petersburg, Florida. While mainly a franchise system, the company owns and operates several corporate locations. Payless Car Rental, Payless Car Sales, Payless Parking and REZlink International are sister companies under the umbrella of Avalon Global Group.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Air Hawaii</span> Defunct American airline based in Hawaii

Air Hawaii was a scheduled passenger airline providing service between Honolulu and the U.S. West Coast cities of Los Angeles and San Francisco. The airline advertised its service as "High Class. Low Fares." Founded by Michael J. Hartley, who previously started The Hawaii Express and would later co-found CheapTickets, Air Hawaii began operations between Honolulu and Los Angeles on November 22, 1985, and added service between San Francisco in December. The airline almost immediately ran into financial problems and discontinued operations on February 19, 1986.

Hotwire is a travel website that offers airline tickets, hotel rooms, rental cars, and vacation packages. It operates by selling off unsold travel inventory at discounted prices. The company is headquartered in San Francisco, CA, Hotwire, Inc. is an operating company of the Expedia Group, which also operates the website ClassicVacations, Expedia, Hotels.com, Orbitz, Travelocity and Egencia.

Mokulele Airlines is a regional airline operating in Hawaii. The airline scheduled inter-island and charter flights, primarily between smaller airports and its hubs at Kahului Airport on the island of Maui and Daniel K. Inouye International Airport in Honolulu on the island of Oahu. The airline was acquired by Southern Airways Express in 2019 but continues to operate under its own brand within the larger airline. Both Southern Airways and Mokulele Airlines are subsidiaries of Surf Air Mobility.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">ATPCO</span>

The Airline Tariff Publishing Company is a privately held corporation that engages in the collection and distribution of fare and fare-related data for the airline and travel industry. ATPCO currently works with more than 400 airlines worldwide, and it supplies more than 99% of the industry’s intermediated fare data to all the major airfare pricing engines, storing over 318 million active fares in its database and managing an average of 15 million fare changes each day.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Travelport</span> Smallest, by revenue, of the top three global distribution systems

Travelport Worldwide Ltd provides distribution, technology, payment solutions for the travel and tourism industry. It is the smallest, by revenue, of the top three global distribution systems (GDS) after Amadeus IT Group and Sabre Corporation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aloha Air Cargo</span> Cargo airline of the United States

Aeko Kula, LLC, DBA Aloha Air Cargo, is an all-cargo airline in the United States, headquartered in Honolulu, Hawaii, operating from a hub at Daniel K. Inouye International Airport. Formerly Aloha Airlines, it became an independent cargo operator following the closure of the passenger airline in 2008.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aqua-Aston Hospitality</span> Hotel management company based in Honolulu, Hawaii

Aqua-Aston Hospitality, LLC is a Honolulu-based hotel management company operating a multi-branded line of hotels, condominiums and vacation resort properties primarily located in Hawaii. The chain was purchased by Marriott Vacations Worldwide in 2018.

Trip.com is a Chinese-owned multinational travel service conglomerate with 45,000 employees. It is one of the world's largest online travel agencies with over 400 million users worldwide, and also the parent of Skyscanner.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Barney Harford</span> British-American technology executive

Barney Merrick Harford is a British–American technology executive. Harford is a member of the board of directors for United Airlines and RealSelf.

Skiplagged.com is an online travel agency and metasearch engine for booking flights and hotels. It popularized the tactic of hidden city ticketing, also known as skiplagging.

References

  1. 1 2 Torres-Kitamura, Maria (September 1996). "Up, up and away". Hawaii Business. Retrieved 2006-12-20.
  2. ↑ Staff writer (2001-06-05). "Business Briefs". Honolulu Star-Bulletin. Retrieved 2006-12-20.
  3. ↑ Lynch, Russ (2001-08-13). "Cheap Tickets bought out". Honolulu Star-Bulletin. Retrieved 2006-12-20.
  4. ↑ Lynch, Russ (2001-08-02). "Cheap Tickets' profits plunge 76 percent". Honolulu Star-Bulletin. Retrieved 2006-12-20.
  5. ↑ Gelsi, Steve (2007-05-10). "Orbitz files second IPO, eyes $750 mln". MarketWatch. Retrieved 2007-10-22.
  6. ↑ "About CheapTickets". 2006. Archived from the original on 2006-12-19. Retrieved 2006-12-20.
  7. ↑ Branch Jr., Alfred (September 1, 2010). "New Jersey court dismisses case against TicketNetwork and Orbitz over alleged 'phantom tickets'". TicketNews. Retrieved January 10, 2012.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.