First advertising campaign to kick off next year

New motor broker Go Skippy has broken its target to write £80m gross written premium (GWP) in its first year, its chief executive Arron Banks has said.

Speaking to Insurance Times, Banks said he expected Go Skippy to write 250,000 policies next year, with an average premium of £580 – giving it a total of £145m.

Go Skippy launched last November and is backed by a panel of more than 10 insurers, including Southern Rock, which is also controlled by Banks. It had targetted £70m GWP in its first year.

Banks said Southern Rock now uses the rating engine it had previously used to price policies for Brightside with Go Skippy.

“The business was running through Brightside and the aggregators. All we’ve done is redirect it to our own business,” he said.

TV advertising for Go Skippy will kick off in the first quarter of next year, following a radio campaign on Talk Sport and Heart FM this year.

Banks, who bought the rights to the 1960s TV show Skippy the Bush Kangaroo, is also in discussions with TV channels about bringing the old show back to TV later next year.  

“Something like 80% of the population over 40 has heard of Skippy, so it’s already a quite well known brand without any marketing money spend,” he said.

Brightside

Banks also revealed that he is mulling over a bid for Brightside after watching its share price drop 25.5% since he sold his stake in the company.

Banks sold 27.5m shares to Markerstudy on 11 February at 24p per share and the share price has since fallen 27% to 17.5p on Friday.

Last Monday Brightside slashed its expected profit by 20% after its online business was hit by capacity restrictions from Southern Rock.

Banks said: “I left over a disagreement in strategy and it’s clear from these results I feel vindicated.”

“With the decline in the share price I might be tempted to look at the company again and consider my options. It’s clear the business is heading in the wrong direction.”

Banks left Brightside after his pitch to launch Go Skippy was voted down by fellow board members.

But interim chief executive Paul Chase-Gardener said Banks’ plans for Go Skippy at the time was to launch as an aggregator, not a broker.

Topics