TRAVEL group Fraser Eagle is selling its travel agencies in Great Harwood and Barrowford as part of a restructuring its business.

Group operations director Kevin Dean, explained that the company's travel shops, which traded under the Worldchoice brand, were no longer a core part of the group's activities.

The Accrington-based company now focuses on its holiday packages and on providing replacement coach services for train companies when services are delayed or cancelled.

Mr Dean said the Great Harwood shop, in Queen Street, had already been sold to another travel agent and negotiations were being finalised on the Barrowford agency, in Cromwell Terrace.

Both shops employ two people.

He added that no decision had been taken on the future of its last remaining Worldchoice outlet in Blackburn Road, Accrington, where six people are employed.

"Profit margins in the retail travel business are very tight and our shops had not been as successful as we had hoped," he said.

"As a group of companies, we have grown rapidly over the past five years and our travel agencies were no longer in line with with everything else."

Fraser Eagle has moved from a local coach operator to a group employing more than 450 people and the company is a market leader in arranging alternative coach travel for train companies when rail services are disrupted.

Worldchoice is the trading name used by independent travel agents.

Fraser Eagle's decision to sell its travel agencies does not affect other Worldchoice agencies.