Daily Podcast: Hilton Earnings Bounce Back

Today’s edition of Skift’s daily podcast discusses Hilton’s profitable first quarter, Sabre’s bullish business projections, and a threat to Africa’s wildlife tourism.

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Episode Notes

Hilton is making massive progress in its rebound thanks to a surge in group bookings, which the company expects to return to pre-Covid levels within 12 months, reports Senior Hospitality Editor Sean O’Neill. In-person events all but stopped during the pandemic.

President and CEO Christopher Nassetta said during Hilton’s first-quarter earnings call on Tuesday that his sales team is struggling to keep with all leads coming in for the second half of 2022 and next year. Group revenue booked in the first quarter for all future periods was down just 4 percent compared to 2019 levels. Nassetta said social and smaller events are driving the company’s recovery while it’s also seen a surge in demand for company meetings and conventions.

Hilton’s good news also included a profitable first quarter, generating $211 million in net income compared to a $108 million loss from the same period in 2021. In addition, the company saw its first-quarter revenues record a 96 percent year-over-year increase.

Next, business travel has largely struggled to fully recover to pre-pandemic metrics. But travel technology vendor Sabre said it’s seeing the sector make progress in its rebound, writes Senior Hospitality Editor O’Neill.

Sabre CEO Sean Menke said at its first quarter earnings call on Tuesday that business travel is moving toward a recovery that he believes can only be interrupted by a surge in Covid cases. Aviation giant Southwest Airlines is also seeing a rebound in corporate travel, with the carrier reporting that its business travel revenue in March 2022 surpassed the mark recorded for the same month three years ago.

However, despite Sabre’s optimism about business travel continuing to make progress in its recovery, O’Neill writes the sector still has a long way to go to reach its pre-pandemic glory days. Corporate travel agency bookings in the first quarter were roughly two-thirds of the mark recorded during the same period in 2019.

We end today in Africa. Giraffes have long appeared in materials promoting travel to the continent, but their current status as endangered species is threatening wildlife tourism to Africa, writes Contributor Harriet Akinyi.

Akinyi writes that giraffes are a large draw for visitors to Africa, a continent where wildlife tourism is enormously lucrative. The sector contributes about $29 billion to the African economy and employs 3.6 million people. But giraffes are facing numerous threats on multiple fronts, such as climate change, disease and poaching. Akinyi cites two subspecies of giraffes that the International Union for the Conservation of Nature has placed on its Red List of threatened species.

Dr. Patrick Omondi, the director of wildlife research for the Kenya Wildlife Service, said the widespread loss of tourism jobs during the pandemic has put giraffes in greater danger. That downturn has contributed to the rise of poaching, with bush meat being seen as an increasingly valuable material for those who lost their livelihoods during the pandemic.