In order to create offers with a very good price-performance ratio, such as three-star family clubs, in view of the economic framework conditions, the Suneo brand is to be strongly expanded, Ebel announced at the presentation of the balance sheet in response to a question from fvw|TravelTalk. Suneo still has considerable potential, and the aim is to give this brand a “push”, said Ebel.

At the presentation of the 2023 summer programme, TUI Deutschland had already presented seven new Suneo hotels on Crete, Kos, on the Turkish Aegean, in Tunisia, Italy and Austria, as well as in Germany for the first time. The first German hotel of the budget brand is the children’s resort in Trassenheide opened last year by the Usedomer Seetelhotels Group, which will be reopened at the end of December as TUI Suneo Kinderresort.

New luxury brand not to be called “TUI”

ut Ebel also sees opportunities for more business in the luxury segment. Here a new brand is being developed, “which will not be called TUI”. He did not want to name it yet.

Most recently, the group’s hotel division had strongly expanded the TUI Blue brand, which has a whole range of upscale facilities, such as the new adults-only TUI Blue Olhuveli Romance Island on the Maldives, which opened in winter. For the luxury segment, the tour operator also runs the separate Airtours brand in Germany, as reported by fvw.

In order to expand in a more capital-efficient way, the group had already switched to a course known as “asset right” before the pandemic, in which TUI determines the concept and quality of new hotels via management and franchise agreements or joint ventures and takes over the marketing, but in most cases does not own the hotel properties.