Online Vacation Center Holdings, the
Plantation, Fla.-based online cruise seller, said it has purchased
La Fern, Inc. a Miami Lakes, Florida travel agency operating as
eLeisureLink.com, and Houston-based Thoroughbred Travel, which
operates under the name Journeys Unlimited, a luxury travel package
marketer.
OVC paid $400,000,
including cash and OVC common stock for La Fern, and $250,000, also
in cash and OVC stock for Thoroughbred Travel.
Thoroughbred said
its annual revenue was approximately $800,000 in 2005 while La Fern
said it made about $500,000 in 2005. Both acquisitions were
expected to be accretive to earnings in 2007.
These are two of
just the latest acquisitions by OVC, which calls itself an
"aggregator of diversified vacation sellers", and CEO Ed Rudner has
said that the company's general strategy is to "diversify through
[acquisitions in] the travel industry".
In August, it
announced the acquisition of Phoenix International Publishing, a
U.K. publisher of consumer magazines and guides about travel to the
U.S. and Canada.
To contact the
reporter who wrote this article, send e-mail to Johanna Jainchill
at [email protected].