Suzanne Al celebrates her 20th anniversary at Sunny Cars this year, where she has risen to the position of marketing director for the Netherlands, Belgium and France. It’s high time for the one-off column ’20 questions to Suzanne…’ 1.How did you end up at Sunny Cars? ‘I got a call from a recruitment agency that was active in the travel industry, Jobs in Travel. There was a vacancy for Marketing & Sales support at Sunny Cars. And that appealed to me, to go back to marketing.’ 2.What makes your job fun? ‘I especially like the focus on the customer, so that we keep improving our product to make it flawless for the customer, so that the process runs smoothly and without friction. I really enjoy increasing the brand awareness of Sunny Cars and making people enthusiastic. My job has a lot of variety, with a bit of PR, branding, online marketing and web development. It’s a great combination of strategy and practice.’ 3.Your product is already very complete. Is there anything left to improve? ‘I think we’ve covered everything enough, although you never know what will happen locally, so customers will have doubts about whether they need a certain service or insurance when they arrive. We simply take away all doubt with our all-inclusive offer. The only area for improvement is to ensure that the process from booking to returning the car is as smooth as possible. There’s always something to optimize.’ 4. You warn customers on the vouchers that they should call if the landlord on site wants to sell them extra insurance. That doesn’t sound like a good relationship with your supplier. ‘We work with up to 300 partners, with whom we have very good relationships, but such a supplier sometimes has 30 or more offices. You cannot assume that every desk employee at every office is aware of exactly what the Sunny Cars product offers compared to other parties. At the end of the day, it’s not our cars and we don’t instruct them. It’s not that bad. That warning is simply a back-up for the customer, so that they feel confident and do not hesitate. When in doubt, we’re there, because that’s where we make the difference. We’d rather have people call us and we solve the problem, than when someone feels insecure and signs something they shouldn’t have signed up for.” 5.What can you miss like a toothache in your work? “I don’t really have that. What I do find annoying is that there have been a lot of meetings lately. Due to corona, teams have started working hybrid and more and more meetings have been scheduled. I sometimes look at my calendar and the whole day is full of online meetings and consultations. That ‘consultation’ was much less before corona. I try to push that back and ask if I really need to be there. Like: this meeting could have been an email.’ 6.What is the biggest change in 20 years of Sunny Cars? “We have become known as a brand throughout the industry. In the beginning, only travel agencies knew us, as a B2B player, otherwise we were unknown. Now everyone in the industry really knows what we stand for. And that we also serve the entire travel industry. Our product is sold through retail, but is also integrated with tour operators. We’ve also built up a lot of brand awareness among consumers. We have a lot of fans who trust us. The brand has grown tremendously. We now do much more than just travel agencies. We have a lot of loyal fans who appreciate Sunny Cars, a lot of happy customers.” The complete interview with Suzanne Al, with all 20 questions and answers, can be read in the recently published TravMagazine #49. ‘My guilty pleasure is music from the 80s and 90s’ Photo: Suzanne Al during the celebration of her anniversary with (from left to right) Kai Sannwald (founder and CEO), Thorsten Lehmann (Managing Partner) and Hans Knottnerus (Managing Director Netherlands, Belgium and France).
