Airline Industry Executive Named President and CEO of Preview Travel

Business Wire, July 28, 1999

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 28, 1999--

Christopher E. Clouser, a Northwest Airlines senior executive, is joining Preview Travel, a leading online travel service, as president, chief executive officer and a member of the company's board of directors.

He will assume his new position at Preview Travel after an appropriate transition of his duties at Northwest Airlines. The announcement was made today by James Hornthal, founder and chairman of the San Francisco-based company.

Clouser has served as senior vice president at Northwest Airlines, the world's fourth largest airline, since 1991, and was a key executive at the carrier responsible for all global communications and branding, loyalty programs, advertising, human resources, audit and security and administration.

In addition to travel industry expertise, Clouser brings with him broad experience in worldwide communications programs focused on attracting and serving consumers. Prior to Northwest Airlines, he held officer positions at Bell Atlantic Corp., Hallmark Cards Inc., and Sprint Corp.

"Chris has a track record of success in building global consumer brands -- a skill that will be increasingly important as the online travel industry grows rapidly," said Hornthal. "His years of airline industry travel experience, in particular, will be a tremendous asset to the company as we continue to build deep relationships with our suppliers and our customers."

"I've watched the online travel industry grow quickly, and it is my belief that the success of this important e-commerce sector will depend in large part on the strength of alliances with the millions of Preview Travel customers and major suppliers," said Clouser.

"In the end, it is this kind of effective partnering that will benefit the traveling public. I'm excited about the opportunity to play an important role in that evolution by taking a leadership role at a company that is extremely well positioned to succeed," Clouser added.

Preview Travel (Nasdaq:PTVL) is a leading provider of online travel services for leisure and small-business travelers. It offers one-stop shopping for airline tickets, vacation packages, car rentals, hotels and cruises, as well as integrated access to travel information, merchandise, news and world-class customer service.

Preview Travel's trained travel agents provide customer service 24 hours a day, seven days a week via a toll-free number and email. Preview Travel has a growing community of more than 8 million registered members and reported gross bookings of $200.1 million in 1998 and $90 million in Q2'99.

Preview Travel was one of the Top Most Visited Web Properties on the Internet according to Media Metrix (April '99) and was ranked the Number One Online Travel Service by Gomez Advisors (Summer '99).

The company operates its own award-winning Web site at www.previewtravel.com and the primary travel service on America Online at AOL keyword: previewtravel. In addition, Preview Travel provides the primary travel services on AOL.com, Excite, Lycos, Snap and USA Today.