Education holidays more popular

Dublin: Holidaybreak, the seller of Eurocamp and Keycamp holidays, is looking for acquisitions in Ireland and north-eastern or southeastern England.

The company said full-year profit fell 84% as customers took fewer higher-cost adventure trips and it took a charge on an acquisition.

Net income dropped to £2.8 million (€3.1m) in the year ended September 30 from £18m (€19.8m) a year earlier, the Northwich company said.

Holidaybreak is looking to focus on educational trips, a category where it says spending has grown 10% annually for the last five years. In its adventure-travel unit, which posted an operating loss, it cut staff by 35% to about 90 and reduced the number of trips by about a quarter to 450, chairman John Coleman said.