On the Beach’s plans for sunshine.co.uk following acquisition

On the Beach bought Sunshine for £12 million last May, describing it as a “highly complementary” brand that would add 200,000 passengers to its 1.2 million-passenger base.

It was On the Beach’s first “significant acquisition”, one the OTA felt it could easily “bolt on” to its existing beach holiday brand.

It remains a separate operation though, albeit benefiting from investment from On the Beach, Britain’s fifth largest Atol holder, and access to its technology platforms.

However, Sunshine significantly extended its Atol licence this spring adding nearly 90,000 more Atol-protected seats, placing On the Beach Group ahead of Expedia.

Reporting the group’s profits for the six months to March 31, Simon Cooper, On the Beach chief executive, told TTG the OTA remained “very pleased” with the acquisition.

“It’s a clean, well-run business,” he said. “In it, we saw opportunities to invest in the technology there. We’ve also been able to start investing revenue back into marketing activity.

“Looking ahead, we may drive differentiation between the brands; at the moment they’re both selling similar products without us making one upmarket or one more mass market. We are delighted with what we have been able to do with Sunshine so far.”

Paul Meehan, On the Beach’s finance director, said although the brand was in good shape, it had suffered from a lack of investment previously.

“It’s still very early days in the Sunshine relationship,” he said. “We have invested heavily in the brand, and it will benefit from the On the Beach platform.”

Meehan said the growth of On the Beach was a continuation of the “ongoing migration from offline to online” business.