Classic Travel wins a resilience award at SLIM Brand Excellence Awards 2020

Classic Travel, the IATA accredited subsidiary of Expolanka Holdings PLC, won a Restart Resilience Award under the service sector large category at the recent SLIM Brand Excellence Awards 2020.

Organised for the first time by SLIM Sri Lanka, the prestigious Restart Resilience Award was awarded to recognize and reward the outstanding efforts of organisations which withstood and overcame the challenges resulting from the pandemic.

"We are delighted and honoured to have been recognised by SLIM for our enduring spirit and our pursuit of excellence in superior customer experiences. While being deeply affected by the many implications of the COVID-19' pandemic in Sri Lanka, which brought the global travel industry to a deafening halt,  Classic nevertheless strived hard to offer an uninterrupted service to its customers. As we come back bolder and stronger in the new normal, we will continue to invest our efforts in maintaining consistently good customer services through an enhanced travel service portfolio," said Shiham Imamudeen, Chief Executive Officer of Classic Travel in a media release issued by the company.

The stringent awarding process evaluated numerous financial and operational areas, including the company’s response to mitigate the impact of the pandemic on its internal and external stakeholders, how it minimized the impact of operating efficiencies across the organisation, its revised process and strategy, performance during the crisis as well as its business continuity plan for future crises. Winners were chosen across four categories; consumer goods, service sector, consumer goods SME, and service sector SME.

“The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in new challenges across organisations. It brought certain industries like travel and leisure a virtual complete stop whilst creating demand pressures to online transaction businesses which were not ready for the surge. It disrupted supply chains, route to market execution and customer interactions. Buying behaviour changed and consumer earnings impeded. Some organisations, faced this challenge, reengineered their processes and overcame. SLIM Brand Excellence Awards 2020 was hosted to recognise these companies that stood strong in the face of disruptive change,” the release said.