The evergreen appeal of the Sunshine State

  • Europe’s leading Florida holiday specialists Ocean Holidays announces a record Easter for bookings to the U.S state, experiencing a 65% increase compared to 2019
  • UK travellers are on average spending £1,500 more than in 2019 on luxury upgrades for their trips this Easter to enhance the holiday experience
  • Villa demand surges with an increase of over 10% on 2019 as consumers seek privacy

Florida has been through a transformative period over the past two years, with domestic migration to the state increasing significantly throughout the pandemic.[1] With Brits now able to travel to the state unimpeded by restrictions, Ocean Holidays has recorded its busiest Easter ever in its 19-year history.

For many, this will be the first Easter they have been able to travel abroad since 2019 and Brits are seizing the opportunity to treat themselves to a long-haul trip. The UK’s fastest growing travel group,[2] Ocean Holidays, has experienced a 65% increase in bookings to Florida for Easter 2022, compared to 2019. Travellers are also spending over £1,500 more per trip than they did in 2019 during the same period, indicative of Brits’ desire to make the most of their holiday abroad.  

“We’re seeing Brits flock in their droves to longer-haul destinations such as Florida, seemingly making up for lost time following a heavily disrupted two-year period. We’ve seen an incredible 65% uptick in bookings to the state, and as a result this is our busiest Easter period to date,” comments Harry Hastings, co-chief executive, Ocean Holidays. “Over the past few years, the Florida tourism landscape has drastically changed. Where Florida might once have stood for Disney World, Sea World and Spring Break, today it’s more like a holiday of lifetime on steroids.”

PROOF OF POPULARITY

According to ABTA, the USA is second on the list of top 10 overseas destinations people plan to travel to in 2022, climbing from third in 2021.[3] Almost one in five (18.1%) of people plan to travel there this year, with New York and Florida among the most popular destinations.[4]

In 2020 Florida overtook New York with its market share of all oversees visitations, growing from 23.8% in 2019 to 30.3% in 2020, while visits to New York dropped to 21.6% in the same timeframe. Meanwhile, Florida has also overtaken California in the list of US states travellers from the UK and Ireland are most interested in, taking it to the second most sought-after holiday destination behind New York.[5]


[1]https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2022/03/net-domestic-migration-increased-in-united-states-counties-2021.html#:~:text=The%20share%20of%20counties%20that,in%20the%202020%2D2021%20period.

[2]https://www.ocean-holidays.co.uk/

[3]https://www.abta.com/news/abta-reveals-most-popular-destinations-2022-travel-testing-requirements-ease

[4 https://www.abta.com/news/abta-reveals-most-popular-destinations-2022-travel-testing-requirements-ease

[5]https://www.ttgmedia.com/news/new-research-shows-increased-interest-in-lesser-known-florida-destinations-32484

EVOLUTION OF FLORIDA AND FRESH APPEAL

Florida is no longer just about retirees, Spring Break and Disney. More than 33,000 New Yorkers packed up and moved to Florida during the pandemic, and many are making the move permanent[1]. Given this new influx of tourists and residents, and the subsequent boost to the economy, tourism in the state has been forced to evolve to meet this unprecedented demand by diversifying its products to meet the needs of the new demographics.

We’re seeing a trend towards experience-based, twin-centre holidays. This means combining destinations, such as a Disney theme park on-site stay with a villa stay, or a Gulf Coast Beach extension. Some travellers are also going further afield and twinning Orlando with New York, Vegas and other popular US destinations to make more of their time in the States.

SURGE IN VILLA HOLIDAYS  

There has been a fresh surge in demand for villas, accelerated by the pandemic as people sought their own private accommodation to avoid other people in hotels. Now, over 35% of Ocean Holiday bookings made for Easter 2022 are villa holidays, an increase of over 10% in comparison to 2019.

The demand is such that Ocean Holidays is expanding its villa portfolio in the region by over 150% by the end of 2022, offering new accommodation in increasingly visited areas such as Bear’s Den Reunion, Solara, and Sonoma.

With the fresh surge in demand, coupled with travellers finally travelling again after waiting for years, comes a higher level of service expected. “Over the pandemic we’ve looked at ways to optimise the customer experience, by evolving how our staff work,” comments Harry Hastings, co-chief executive, Ocean Holidays. “Customers now can check into their villa online, and head straight there from the flight, something that was not possible before. All of our staff are trained in concierge services, so that when in Florida customers can speak to one of the Ocean Holidays team locally 24 hours a day based at our welcome centre 10 minutes from Walt Disney World.”


[1] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9815601/More-33-000-New-Yorkers-moved-Florida-pandemic.html

Ocean Holidays Wins Feefo Platinum Trusted Service Award

We are delighted to announce that Ocean Holidays has won this year’s Platinum Trusted Service Award from Feefo. This recognition is for businesses that “put trust first” and for our “outstanding achievement in delivering consistently excellent customer service.” To reach the coveted Platinum level, a business must have provided Gold Trusted Service for three consecutive years with a rating of at least 4.5/5 – we are proud to have maintained a perfect score of 5/5.

Trust for Ocean Holidays starts by looking after our employees, and we believe that by doing so customers will receive the very best service. We have recently been accredited as a Living Wage Employer, and we credit this award to our people-first principles. Beyond financial benefits, we also value people as individuals, right through to our personalised holiday packages. These values have taken us from the humble beginnings of Teletext marketing for Orlando holidays, to a worldwide leisure portfolio for all types of travel.

Co-CEO of Ocean Holidays, Harry Hastings, offered this response:
“Last year we were awarded a ‘Good To Work For’ accreditation by the B Companies survey, however, we wanted to ensure that we keep on improving. We are so grateful to our customers to have achieved the Platinum Trusted Service Award in 2022 which is shaping up to be our best yet. After a record-breaking number of bookings since January, we have bold ambitions for the future, where we will always stick to our founding mission of doing the right thing by our colleagues, customers, and partners.”

Ocean Holidays Group Becomes Accredited Living Wage Employer

Ocean Holidays Group, the UK’s largest growth travel group*, has become an accredited Living Wage employer, meaning all full-time staff earn a minimum of £23,000 per year.

The Romford-based business, which has more than 150 employees, joins almost 9,000 other UK companies which have voluntarily signed up to pay their employees a real Living Wage. This is an independently calculated hourly rate of pay that is based on the actual cost of living, determined each year by the Living Wage Foundation.

The real Living Wage is higher than the Government’s National Minimum Wage or the National Living Wage. It is currently £9.90 in the UK, with a higher rate of £11.05 for London, reflecting the higher costs of living in the capital. The government’s national living wage for those over 23 years old is currently £8.91, and £8.36 for the under 23s, with no London weighting.

Ocean Holidays Group head of people, Karen Sheehan, commented: “We are delighted to be able to offer our team the real Living Wage, and view this step as an important means of us encouraging more young people to work in the travel industry by offering them a more meaningful salary.”

In the last year, the group has employed two apprentices, and before it was disbanded in December 2021, took on two employees through the government’s Kickstart Scheme, which provided funding to create jobs for 16- to 24-year-olds on Universal Credit. After successfully passing through these programmes, they would move to the real Living Wage as full-time members of staff.

Sheehan said: “This week is National Apprenticeship Week and at Ocean Holidays Group we pride ourselves on offering our under 18-year-old apprentices 60 per cent more than the Government apprentice minimum wage. By investing in our people, at all levels, not only is it the right thing to do, but we have seen better staff retention levels and been able to attract a greater calibre of new recruits.”

Ocean Holidays Group, which also recently announced new programmes of work to champion diversity and inclusion, sustainability and community, has extended the initiative to its staff in its Florida office with best equivalent salary guarantees.

The group’s employees in the USA are paid a minimum of $15 per hour, and benefits include full private healthcare, and holiday entitlement of a minimum of 20 days plus Bank Holidays.

*Ocean Holidays Group is the largest growing UK travel group in 2021 – 2022 period compared to the last pre-pandemic year in 2019-2020 as per CAA rankings and the BDO diaries 2022.

Ocean Holidays Group Commits to Making Strides to Balance People, Planet and Profit as It Eyes Further Growth

Group unveils family-friendly policies, mental health support plus launches diversity and inclusion, sustainability, and community programmes

Ocean Holidays Group, the UK’s largest growth travel group*, has committed to making strides in balancing people, planet, and profit in 2022 and beyond, as it launches programmes dedicated to bolstering diversity and inclusion, sustainability and community work.

Harry Hastings, co-chief executive, said: “We start 2022 off having had a record-breaking year for new bookings in 2021 and bold ambitions for the future. Today, we are the largest growth travel group in the UK and our commitments are not only good for business but also ensure we continue to do the right thing by our staff, our customers, partners and wider society.

“We have spent the past six months going through every element of the business and have pulled together our business plan to ensure that future growth is underpinned by our people, our community and our planet.

“Last year we were awarded a ‘Good To Work For’ accreditation by the B Companies survey, and we want to ensure that we keep improving.”

Enhancing its commitment to its people, the group has recently started working with everymindatwork as its mental health wellbeing partner and has introduced a number of family-friendly policies for all staff, including pregnancy loss, parental bereavement leave and specific menopause support.

“Family-friendly policies help ensure employees can take leave, work from home and pursue other options, when necessary, in order to take care of family needs. Reducing team-members’ stress enhances job focus and allows us to retain employees who may otherwise resign to take care of family matters.

It also helps us maintain employee satisfaction because of the focus we place on family and work-life balance, as well as demonstrating the value we place on our team, of course,” commented Hastings.

Alongside this, are three separate programmes looking at diversity and inclusion, sustainability, and community.

Speciality consultancy Compelling Culture has been appointed as our external diversity and inclusion advisers, who will work alongside Karen Sheehan, head of people, as guardians of this stream of work.

Hastings added: “We have appointed external resource for this programme as we feel their expertise will ensure we build the foundations for learning, developing and importantly taking meaningful action that ensures long-term impact.”

Overseeing the community work is Matt Rains, programme manager, and Anna-Maria Janssen, head of product and commercial, is leading up the sustainability stream as its guardian.

Within all three programmes will be teams of up to six champions and team members from the group. They, along with the programme guardians, will kick off work in February and work with the wider company to deliver on integrating its environmental and social impact into day-to-day operations. The brief includes a three-year road map of measurable goals to be achieved by 2024.

“A recent staff survey highlighted that the team at Ocean Holidays Group is very supportive of being a part of this important work, with more than 80 per cent wanting to get personally involved. We realise that we are only just at the beginning of this project, but we are fully committed.

“Like many businesses who are seriously considering their impact we all have to start somewhere. We will be updating on our progress on all fronts throughout the months and years ahead,” said Hastings.

*Ocean Holidays Group is the largest growing UK travel group in 2021 – 2022 period compared to the last pre-pandemic year in 2019-2020 as per CAA rankings and the BDO diaries 2022.

Ocean Florida launches programme to travel trade with agent competition

Specialist Florida tour operator, Ocean Florida, launches competition for agents to win a Florida holiday for four as it expands travel trade programme

Ocean Florida, the UK’s No.1 specialist tour operator to Florida, is set to scale up sales of its package holidays to the UK travel trade following a successful trial that was launched in July 2020 in response to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Whilst Ocean Beds has been successfully selling villas to the UK travel trade for several years, Ocean Florida had previously only sold Florida holidays direct to the consumer.

The initiative was launched in response to the impact of COVID-19 on the travel industry as Ocean Florida was able to leverage its ability to sell package holidays to the USA for dates beyond when airline seats were on sale, with guaranteed pricing.

Following a limited roll-out with a few consortia including The Travel Network Group, Advantage Travel and Barrhead Travel to name a few, Ocean Florida now has over 250 agents actively booking not only USA holidays, such as Orlando villa and hotel holidays, but also Caribbean beach holidays, New York hotels and California road trips.

With a team of 12, including 8 dedicated sales agents, the programme is now being expanded to the wider UK travel trade and they have the chance to win a 12-night holiday for four to Florida in 2023 or 2024 with flights, villa, car hire, and Ocean Explorer tickets all included.

Once an agent signs up to the programme on www.ocean-florida.co.uk/agents and completes the onboarding process, they can join our exclusive Facebook group (Ocean4Agents) where they receive details of exclusive offers and product updates and access to our dedicated trade sales team to support with all their needs.

Melanie Saavedra, Managing Director of Travel Sense Ltd said “Ocean Florida have been an amazing new edition to Travel Sense and we couldn’t be happier. Quote turnaround time is so quick, completely professional with outstanding knowledge and nothing is too much trouble. They are now our go-to for everything USA and more! Great product, great service and a pleasure to work with, we love Ocean Florida.”

Ann-Maria Agar, Head of Trade Sales, said “As soon the travel restrictions came in last March, we leaned on our B2C brand Ocean Florida, who had holidays on sale up to 2024, to assist agents wanting book or amend holidays to later dates. Very quickly we were up and running with a select group of agents and we’re delighted to be expanding our offering to the wider travel trade and launching a holiday competition for our trade partners.”

Harry Hastings, Co-CEO, said “Like many businesses, when COVID-19 hit we had to pivot our business if we wanted to thrive when the market started to fully recover. Our trade sales have become an increasingly important and valued part of our business strategy and we look forward to building our trade programme with travel agents.”

Ocean Holidays Scoops Hat-Trick of Prestigious Awards

Ocean Holidays was delighted to scoop three prestigious awards at a glittering travel industry ceremony in London last night (November 25), including a special award for ‘Rising Brand of the Year’.

Alongside the Rising Brand accolade, we are proud to have been recognised as Champions of Data and Best CRM (Customer Relationship Management) Platform, by online travel news site Travolution. These awards are testament to the company’s successful strategy throughout the last year, which has seen us become the fastest growing tour operator in the latest ATOL listings when compared to the pre-pandemic period.

Ocean Holidays comprises three unique and distinct travel brands. Ocean Florida, the largest direct-to-consumer Florida specialist in Europe; Winged Boots, which leads in personalised luxury leisure holidays; and Ocean Beds, the largest worldwide provider of Florida vacation home rentals to the global travel trade.

Harry Hastings, Co-CEO of Ocean Holidays said: “We are absolutely thrilled to have been recognised by industry leaders for our work over the past year which has been incredibly challenging, to say the least, for the global travel industry. We’ve always put our customers and the smart use of technology and data at the heart of everything we do, and these awards are testament to our strategy and the hard work of our talented team.”

Lee Hayhurst, Travolution executive editor, said: “After such a challenging period we’re delighted that we were able to get our finalists together in a room to celebrate the incredible talent that exists in the travel and technology sectors.
It’s hard not to be impressed by just how the sector has reacted to diversity and found ways to survive, and in many cases thrive, during the most difficult period the sector has ever faced. Congratulations!”

Ocean Holidays Group named “Ones to Watch” by best companies

Ocean Holidays is pleased to announce our special status as “Ones to Watch” by best companies for demonstrating “good” levels of workplace engagement. This is particularly pleasing during a time when the travel industry has had its worst crisis in living memory due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Achieving “Ones to Watch” status requires a score of at least 600/1000. However, having scored 659.3 this is just 0.2 marks off 659.5 which would have resulted in a ‘1 star accreditation’ of ‘very good’ workplace levels of engagement. This has been reason to celebrate in the first year of running the comprehensive b’ companies survey. Being so close to the next level of best companies is a fantastic platform to continue to improve Ocean Holidays as a travel industry leading employer. Employee engagement is more than just survey results. It is a promise of honest conversations and a pledge to provide a rewarding and healthy environment for employees at a company that puts its people first.

Notable highlights in the b’ companies survey include 94% of staff agreeing the company encourages giving back and charitable activities, 92% believing they make a valuable contribution to the success of the organisation and more than 40% of senior managers being women.

For more information visit https://www.b.co.uk/companies/ocean-holidays

Travel Advice

In light of the presence of Covid-19, Ocean Holidays is committed to helping its current customers with existing bookings as well as those who would like to book new packages.

We’d like to thank all our customers for your patience during this tricky and challenging time. Our dedicated teams are working hard to find the right solution for each customer.

More Information

Ocean Florida customers, please CLICK HERE to visit the website for further details

Winged Boots customers, please CLICK HERE to visit the website for further details

Ocean Beds customers, please CLICK HERE to visit the website for further details

Our staff are kept up to date with the latest advice from the FCO, which you can also view here:

https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice

Ocean Holidays Hires First Group Marketing Director

Former Love Holidays and Tui marketing boss Christian Armond has been appointed by Ocean Holidays Group as its first marketing director.

Armond joins the Essex-based destination and luxury holidays specialist having left OTA Love Holidays last October after a year as marketing director.

Prior to that he worked in digital marketing at Tui for just over four years, latterly as head of digital marketing overseeing SEO, PPC, display, affiliates, and biddable social.

Ocean Holidays comprises consumer brand Ocean Florida and upmarket concierge operator Winged Boots, which Armond is tasked with drive continuing growth for.

He will also oversee the B-B Ocean Beds brands, which supplies accommodation to trade partners. Armond is the first non-founder to oversee marketing for the group’s three brands.

Harry Hastings, co-chief executive of Ocean Holidays Group, said: “‘The next phase of our scaling-up plans will rely heavily on the success of our performance-led marketing and we are delighted to be welcoming Christian into our management team as group marketing director. He is the right leader for this new role, with the track record to match.”

Armond, added: “I’m hugely excited to be joining the Ocean Holidays team, and was very impressed with the strategic vision for the business to build on Ocean Florida’s position as the leading Florida specialist, and Winged Boots expertise in personalised luxury travel management”

Ocean Holidays Group has offices in Romford, Essex, and Orlando, Florida. It has seen an average annual revenue growth rate  of 30% over the past five years, surpassing £60million revenue in 2019.

Founders Selected as Part of the Top 50 Most Ambitious Business Leaders

The Ocean Holidays founders are extremely excited to announce they have been selected as part of LDC and The Telegraph’s Top 50 Most Ambitious Business Leaders.

In its second year, this rewarding accolade celebrates the UK’s most ambitious leaders in business who inspire success and shines a light on the unsung heroes of the British Economy. The top 50 leaders will be showcased in The Daily Telegraph during the week of 30th September, with the most ambitious named at a star-studded event on 8th October 2019.

Q&A

What’s your USP?

Daniel: We have built all our technology in-house; we employ 25 developers in the business. Where other companies invest in the front end, we invest in the back end. It means our agents can handle 250 enquiries at any one time. We contact customers within one minute of posting an enquiry and we’ll know what they want and when they want it. No one has been able to challenge us in this niche. Ocean Florida will carry 27,000 passengers this year, and Winged Boots will carry 6,000 and we’re growing 25pc a year.

For you, what is ambition?

Harry: We’re already the largest privately-owned specialist – the only companies bigger than us have their own airline. We want to keep growing both our brands and we are aiming to hit £100m in revenue by 2021. But we are also excited by innovation and technology. We find it very satisfying when we do things that other people can’t. We are really moving the dial in this industry.

How important have your business partners been in achieving your success?

Harry: We are four equal partners: two sets of brothers. This is a family business. We all bring different strengths and skillsets to the business and we all complement each other. We have worked together for 16 years and we have been through the fire together. That has created an important bond. No matter how difficult the decision, we always come together to make it happen.

Click here to see more about the awards