Rebbeca Kingston and Tina Bender became co-owners of Flitch Travel on August 1 – just eight weeks after previous proprietor, Neil Henderson, told them he had made a verbal agreement to sell the Great Dunmow-based agency.

Kingston told TTG that shortly after hearing the news, Bender went on holiday to St Lucia and via text the pair agreed to approach Henderson about acquiring the agency.

Kingston said: “We were texting while Tina was in St Lucia and we kept saying ‘we could’ve bought the place and really done something with it’, so we just thought ‘let’s go for it’.”

The pair said they “couldn’t turn down such an amazing opportunity”, and so used their savings to purchase the business from Henderson and officially agreed the sale on July 7.

“It’s incredibly exciting for us and business has been going so well since we took over,” Kingston added. “The agency has been in Great Dunmow for 20 years and is such a well-known and well-respected name and has a loyal following.”

The pair have brought a new part-time staff member onboard to help run the shop and plan to widen Flitch’s product and customer base.

“Everyone knows Flitch in Dunmow, so going forward we’d like to broaden out and get the name known more widely in Essex,” Kingston said. “There are also tour operators that we don’t currently use and areas we’d like to do more [business] in.”