The homeworking specialist said last week that the industry had “currently stalled”, with 70% of families still to book.

However, co-founder Steve Witt told TTG on Tuesday (6 May) part of the issue was that many of the 720 NJT consultants were themselves on holiday in April.

He said: “It was slumped. Normally during school and Easter holidays our travel consultants are off, so it was not the market that was slumped, it was more a case of right now it’s quieter and now we are expecting a busy last minute peak period. There was a pent-up market for the consumer but our travel consultants were away.”

Witt also cited the late Easter and Donald Trump’s tariffs as having an impact on sales, but said a rebound meant the operator was seeing “2.5-2.6” times the volume year on year. “It is back with a bang,” he said.

The late booking market was a factor across the industry, he added.

“I think we are just going to see a continued upward trend for last-minute bookings. A lot of people have still not booked their summer holiday, families and couples alike. Prices are super keen, people are saying all the key operators have a lot of capacity, so there will be some great pricing. I think consumers will take advantage of that – why would you bother staying in the UK?"

Witt added: “I also think there is a stronger desire to have more holidays than ever before; the average consumer goes on three breaks a year. We’re definitely seeing that trend across more but smaller holidays and with the opening of places like Cape Verde and destinations we may not have thought of in the past.

"Also we’ve seen a big switch to cruise; more of our consultants are booking it than ever before."

Witt said 43% of current bookings were long-haul, up 20% year on year, with average spend up more than £300 to £4,359. US sales had not suffered the ’Trump Slump’, he added. “We have been tracking to see if Trump is affecting US sales, but they are up considerably.”