#25 - Geopolitics and travel
TLDR: Too Long Didn’t Read In the follow-up section, there's a report on the travel habits of Gen Z and Millennials, highlighting their preference for Instagram as the top social media platform 📸🌍, their focus on adventure and outdoor activities 🏞️🌄, and their willingness to spend more on travel 💰✈️. In the main hospitality news, the US ranks 17th in attractiveness among global destinations due to safety, government leadership, and visa rule issues 🇺🇸🌐. Hilton and IHG are expanding in China 🏨🇨🇳, while political decisions in Maldives are causing a loss of Indian tourists 🏝️🇲🇻🇮🇳. The rise of the middle-class travel market is noted, with many hotel brands targeting this segment 🌐💼. In externalities, Taiwan's election results could have implications for geopolitical conflicts 🗳️🇹🇼🌏. In academia, a study from Ghana emphasizes the correlation between HR practices and hotel revenue 📚🏨💰.Finally, a digital hotel operations report by h2c provides insights into industry trends like digital check-in and CRM adoption 📊🏨💻. 0. News snippets Not important enough to expand on, but worth hearing about If you are a fan of the White Lotus show, it was recently announced that season 3 will be filmed in Thailand | DEHOGA, a major German Hospitality Sector association asked its members about the increase of taxes on the F&B. Results. Operators are not happy! 0.5 Follow up Where we follow up on news from previous weeks New Gen Z and Millenial trends Another report on Gen Z and Millennials’ behaviour is out. Where they book, what they book and why they book. Results are slightly different to those from last year and can be seen here. Number 1 Social Media platform is Instagram (1 fifth of the total market share). The number 1 reason to travel is “Adventure and Outdoor Activities”. Around 60% of people book hotels and the rest is distributed amongst vacation rentals and other forms of accommodation. Finally, both Gen Z and Millennials are expected to spend more, 59% of Gen Z and 65% of Millennials. Must be all that money they are currently earning. Choice and Wyndham Part 3 Remember Choice trying to acquire Wyndham? Well, now it's an information war. Wyndham has released a report claiming Choice acquiring them would go against anti-trust laws (creating a quasi-monopoly) and Choice is now releasing a presentation disputing that. 4 Points they don’t agree with are: There are 9 other competitors in the market, therefore it ain’t a monopoly, the acquisition would decrease costs for franchises, guests would get a bigger offer as part of their loyalty programs, Choice expects the commence the process on the 11th of January. The employees of Wyndham are probably convinced too and hyped about the upcoming hostile acquisition. 1. Main Hospitality News Core news related to the industry The US scores 17th in attractiveness among top destinations worldwide. The US is 17 out of 18 top destinations worldwide for global travellers. According to a recent report by Euromonitor International. Reasons for it falling behind are a low safety index, Government leadership and strict customs and visa rules. At least those are the indicators by which the US has scored low and are used to build up the total score. Despite all the above, the land of the free still is number 3 in the world share of inbound visitors even though that has decreased by 0.1%. France was number 1 and Spain number 2. See the full list and how other markets performed over here. Hilton and IHG are capturing the Chinese market. Hilton has opened its 600th hundred hotel in China with its entire brand portfolio, while IHG is on their 700th. IHG on the other hand has 12 of their 19 brands in there. Both are trying to open up in several regions. Hilton has even been named “Best Workplace in Greater China” 4 years in a row. Different sub-brands
