Destination Club Levity: The Ultimate Escapes Bankruptcy

By: Destination Club News
Date: November 5, 2010

Let's not mince words. The Ultimate Escapes bankruptcy has been a tragic event for many. Well over a thousand members not only lost their upcoming travel reservations, but also their membership deposits, often into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Employees in Kissimmee, Kansas City, and Fort Collins have all lost their jobs. Ultimate Escapes rivals will continue to feel the reverberations of the bankruptcy filing for years to come as potential members conduct their due diligence review of the industry. We wanted to take a moment away from the bad news and bring some levity into the situation, in this chapter focusing on the media coverage of the Ultimate Escapes downfall.

Those that monitor the destination club industry know the Ultimate Escapes players well, all fixtures in the industry for years: Chief Executive Officer and Founder Jim Tousignant, Chairman Richard Keith, Chief Financial Officer Philip Callaghan, and others. When The New York Times covered Demeure being selected as the winning bidder of the bankrupt club, they attributed the creation of Ultimate Escapes to Founder Roger Tousignant.

Just yesterday, a bankruptcy focused website grouped the Ultimate Escapes filing into an article about Gulfstream International Group's voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy, calling Ultimate Escapes "another luxury airline."

Yet another publication announced that Ultimate Escapes was acquiring the China based Enson Assets for a net purchase value of approximately $110 million. The UE that they were actually looking for was Universal Electronics.

Despite being a billion dollar industry with clubs and members around the world, it shows that the destination club concept remains unknown by the vast majority of the public. It is unfortunate that many will learn about this still relatively new travel option through its stumbles, but it will be up to today's generation of clubs to reestablish the model and bring it back into the positive news realm.

Please, check back frequently for more news on the destination club industry and until then, have a wonderful and safe weekend.