Singapore hotels and attractions have been well received in various global markets, with particularly strong demand from outbound Chinese travellers, despite the ongoing pandemic. Trip.com Group recently recorded sales of over 12,000 room nights amounting to a Gross Merchandise Value of over S$3.75 million over two recently concluded livestreams in Singapore and China.
Technology will play a key role in the long road to recovery from the COVID crisis for India's hospitality industry, according to a comprehensive new report, Indian Hospitality at Tech Tipping Point, produced by RMS Cloud.The report reveals hotels using cloud-based property and revenue management technology have been out-performing the market for many years - a trend RMS founder Peter Buttigieg believes will accelerate post-COVID."There is no question technology will be key to the rebound, enabling hotels who use it properly to better manage demand generation in an online world and reconnect with their customers," says Mr Buttigieg."It's clear that hotels which have embraced technology are doing much better than those that haven't and we believe this trend will be amplified over time."Key report findings:
A new report by SiteMinder, the global hotel industry's leading guest acquisition platform, has signalled the importance for Thailand's hoteliers to employ new marketing, distribution and operational strategies to cater for the looming rise in domestic travel.
Hong Kong Disneyland is closing its gates again less than one month after it reopened, following a new coronavirus outbreak in the city.
Messe Berlin (Singapore) announced today that ITB Asia, MICE Show Asia and Travel Tech Asia will go virtual from 21 - 23 October 2020. Originally scheduled on the same dates, the annual travel trade show will instead be held on a virtual platform, due to the uncertainty over continued global travel restrictions and safe distancing measures.
Waiting on the government's go-ahead, travel bubbles and a lack of domestic tourists are the overriding concerns for a Bali travel industry trying to battle through the COVID pandemic according to key leading speakers at the recent 'Bali Tourism - The Way Back' virtual event organized by Delivering Asia Communications and C9 Hotelworks together with the Bali Hotels Association and Horwath HTL.
Thailand's domestic-led tourism recovery was at the forefront of a virtual online event "TTF2020 - Special Bangkok Edition" today that tapped more than a 1,000 leading domestic and international travel and hotel industry participants. Research from hospitality consulting group C9 Hotelworks and Delivering Asia Communications focused on domestic inter-Thailand visitor market whose size at more than 227 million in 2019 stole the limelight versus 39.8 million international visitors.
Hotel owners and operators in the Maldives are learning the hard way how quickly disruption can turn cash flow negative. One key trend in global leisure destinations is a severe liquidity crunch of wholesalers and travel intermediaries, which in turn has created a domino impact on hotels. This has created difficulties for the tourism dependent Indian Ocean island nation. Cash strapped hotels, who are owed significant funds for guests who have already stayed are being forced to negotiate payment terms or event contemplate write offs, are crying foul. Further stress from contracted allocations that cannot be fulfilled has become commonplace as advance deposits are being held by external suppliers. The situation is expected to become worse should wholesalers become insolvent. In Thailand, hoteliers have sought government action with the TUI Group, as despite a 1.8 billion Euro loan being approved by the German central government, they have yet to clear past payments overseas with are due. As hotels look to the reopening journey ahead, a new survey of 1,100 qualified Chinese travelers in first tier cities by hospitality consulting group C9 Hotelworks and Delivering Asia Communications focusing on travel sentiment to the Maldives has pinpointed some key changes forecasted in visitor behavior.
IHG® (InterContinental Hotels Group), one of the world's leading hotel companies, today officially launched its first flagship store on Chinese leading OTA (Online Travel Agent) platform, as part of the partnership with Ctrip, part of Trip.com Group. Both companies will also cooperate in their membership systems, enriching the experiences and benefits for loyalty members from both sides.
It's always exciting reading about emerging startups winning funding and recognition from big-name investors, and more so during the COVID-19 pandemic, when many travel startups are either collapsing or shrinking. Such a win will surely draw more attention and further assert a company's value proposition, regardless of the actual amount raised.
Experience-driven and carbon-neutral retreat Santiburi Koh Samui has unveiled a series of new experiences for people to enjoy from their homes that complement the resort's Lèn programme, a creative concept that allows everyone to discover individual happiness. Via a new virtual reality innovation, Santiburi Koh Samui travellers can teleport themselves to the resort while staying at home. To do so, they just need a VR headset from any brand and watch the VR video, available on Santiburi's YouTube Channel. For those who do not have goggles, they can still experience the property in 360 degrees via a smartphone and the same video.
In the webinar I was a guest presenter last week, I have shared a few post COVID-19 trends and shared my ideas on what hotels GMs can do now to get ahead of the game to welcome Chinese travelers post COVID-19. Happy to receive positive feedback that my suggestions are useful. I decide to elaborate on my ideas and write this article.
The popularity of anime, Japanese animated television shows and films, is motivating Hong Kong fans to visit Japan in a powerful example of cultural "soft power", argue Ph.D. graduate Dr Elizabeth Agyeiwaah, Dr Wantanee Suntikul and BSc graduate Ms Carmen Li of the School of Hotel and Tourism Management (SHTM) at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University and a collaborator in a recently published research paper. Focusing on the reaction of Generation Y anime fans from Hong Kong to the Japanese government's promotion of anime content under the "Cool Japan" initiative, the researchers provide ground-breaking evidence of how and why promoting a country's popular culture abroad can motivate inbound tourism. Their results understandably have profound implications for destination marketers and policy makers in Japan and beyond.
As India unites against COVID-19 and continues to brave through a nation-wide lockdown, Radisson Hotels today announced the launch of #RadissonCares in India; a campaign that leverages the Group's expertise across a range of service areas to make a positive difference in the lives of its guests.
Japan's Olympic delay has upended years of careful planning by organizers and spawned costly headaches for small businesses, hotels and even pro baseball teams, compounding a $12 billion price tag.
The hotel industry is facing a generational crisis at the hands of COVID-19, and it will likely get worse before it gets better. However, even during these hard times, there is light at the end of the tunnel. Thanks to rapid responses, many countries in Asia are already starting to see a recovery in their hotels’ direct bookings, and are regaining control and predictability around their digital marketing strategies. After comprehensive analysis of our hotel data from the start of the year, we’ve identified the countries, trends, and tactics to help hoteliers from US and Europe navigate such uncertain times.
Choice Hotels Asia-Pac CEO, Trent Fraser, has encouraged the company's franchisee members to treat online travel agents as "frenemies" and to encourage guests to book future stays directly in an effort to minimise commission bills.
Owners of small business accommodation in rural China face a difficult choice over whether to expand or retain their authenticity, according to the findings of a study by Dr Honggen Xiao of the School of Hotel and Tourism Management (SHTM) at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University and his co-researchers. In a recently published study, the researchers aim to settle a long-standing debate over whether business expansion is beneficial or harmful to rural tourism businesses, and conclude that entrepreneurs must make a "trade-off" between "enhancing guest experience and achieving economic goals" because growth brings both advantages and disadvantages.
Speaking at the Travel Tech. Summit 2019 in Sydney last week, Tracey Foxall said it was vital for Booking.com to build the connected trip in order to stay relevant.
Singapore-based travel platform Agoda says it is focusing on finding the "best inventory" for its customers, operating with the "best tech" and fending off the intense competition in Asia armed with the "best weapons."There's a theme there.In a wide-ranging interview at WiT Singapore 2019 with WiT's founder Yeoh Siew Hoon, Agoda's CEO John Wroughton Brown, shared his thoughts on Asia, new products, forming "unorthodox" partnerships and the future.As far as Brown is concerned, the competition that his company faces in Asia is so intense that it prepares it for any battle anywhere else.And it does not need to swing a "dragon glass dagger or a light sabre" to ward off the competition amid "enemies" coming from all directions.