Our history

The history of Globalia is inextricably linked to the business trajectory of its executive chairman, Juan José Hidalgo. The origins of what today has become Spain’s leading tourist group can be traced back to 1965 when Hidalgo, an immigrant worker in Switzerland, purchased his first car – a second hand Mercedes – which he used to carry his first customers on the route Zurich – Salamanca – Zurich.

The Early Days

There are several major milestones that marked the company’s trajectory from those early days and up until the creation of the Globalia Business Corporation in 1997. For example, 1971 saw the opening of the first branch of the Viajes Halcón travel agency in Alcántara, Caceres. In 1972, Hidalgo’s business activities, which had until then centred on road travel, ventured into the world of aviation. In December of that year he chartered his first flight with AVIACO to cover the Madrid-Zurich-Madrid route, although it was not until 1987 that the first holiday flight to the Caribbean, Puerto Plata in the Dominican Republic, took off from Madrid’s Barajas Airport. Travelplan, the group’s tour operator, was founded in 1988 and in 1991, a group of investors, with Hidalgo at the head,  acquired Air Europa, a small British airline with a fleet of just nine aircraft in operational leasing for 600 million pesetas.

The group takes off

The World Expo held in Seville in 1992 marked the start of a period of rapid expansion of the company that would eventually become Globalia. Halcón Viajes began to enjoy spectacular growth, opening an average of between 80 to 100 new branches each year throughout the decade. A highly imaginative advertising campaign – featuring the popular character Curro, who holidays in the Caribbean, made a lasting impression on many. In 1993, Air Europa began operating scheduled domestic flights, putting an end to the monopoly held by Iberia. They would soon be followed by routes to London, New York, Paris, Varadero (Cuba), and Salvador de Bahía (Brazil). By 1996, the airline was operating more than 750 scheduled flights each week.

The Globalia Era

The Globalia Business Corporation was founded in 1997 as the holding company for the group’s other firms. Two years later, in May 1999, the group’s central services moved to the new corporate headquarters in Llucmajor (Mallorca). By then, Halcón Viajes and Travelplan had begun operating in Portugal. The year 2000 saw the launch of the group’s hotel division with just a single establishment, but which would lay the foundations for the current Be Live chain, which manages more than 30 hotels around the world with more than 10,000 beds. The crisis that followed the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001 had a major impact on the group’s airline division, which underwent considerable restructuring, enabling it to return to profit in late 2002. In 2003 Pepe business group (Pepetravel, Pepeword, etc.) joined Globalia, and that same year the holding acquired the Viajes Ecuador chain of travel agencies. 

2005 saw the launch of the handling division, which began operating under the trade name Groundforce in major airports in Spain, Portugal, Morocco and Mexico. Other key events that year included the opening of the holding’s new Madrid headquarters and Globalia’s expansion into France. Since then, Globalia has enjoyed steady and constant growth in all its divisions: Air Europa has opened up new routes to America, Europe and Africa, becoming a member of the SkyTeam Alliance in September 2007. Previously, in November 2006, the airline had opened a large hangar at Palma Airport to service its fleet as well as aircraft from other companies. The hotel division received a major boost in February 2007 following the acquisition of the Be Live chain, considerably expanding its business area in the Caribbean. In turn, the Pepe group launched a virtual mobile phone operator under the trade name Pepephone in autumn 2007