Cruise specialist Just Cruise in Stirlingshire closed in September when its owner decided he no longer wanted to continue with the business.

Hays Travel initially took on three of the Larbert-based agency’s staff as homeworkers but has now signed a lease for the contact centre’s premises, to enable the staff to work from their original office. The Just Cruise brand will not be revived.

“We had taken on three of the Just Cruise team – two sales and one in marketing – to work from home, but when they came to see John [Hays, managing director] they really impressed him, so we looked at what we could do,” said Jonathon Woodall, group head of commercial.

He added Hays Travel now hopes to take on a further 10 cruise specialists to work from the Larbert office.

Woodall said Hays had also recruited 19 of the cruise homeworkers made redundant by Thomas Cook in April last year.

“By April, we hope to have around 40 in our cruise division including 10 in the Larbert office and we’ve got big ambitions to grow cruise sales in 2018,” said Woodall.

“With the way we’re trading at the moment, we’ve already decided to increase our growth target for our cruise division. This year has to be the year for us for cruise.”