Dennis Schaal, Skift
TripAdvisor is leveraging its strengths — tours and activities, and restaurants — where it has leadership positions rather than choosing to devote the bulk of its energies in the crowded field of hotels and alternative accommodations. It is a wise choice to differentiate rather than be a mere clone of its competitors.
4 days ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Fickle investors, meaning those without a long-range view, didn't necessarily appreciate the breadth of the TripAdvisor platform in the past. The company isn't the biggest player out there, but its strong positions in tours and activities, as well as restaurants, is injecting momentum.
4 days ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Expedia has dealt with a ton of distractions in recent years as it acquired Wotif, Travelocity, Orbitz Worldwide, and HomeAway, for example. CEO Mark Okerstrom wants to focus on the basics instead, and doesn't want to take bold steps into dining reservations or food delivery for now. On the other hand, Expedia is a very acquisitive company so never say never.
2 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Tablet Hotels found itself a world-class strategic buyer to propel its growth. Tablet as part of Michelin will face huge marketing hurdles, and the challenge of trying to reshape Michelin's legacy guide offerings.
3 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Booking.com is taking its sweet time to implement a flights-to-attractions travel offering. Some would say the pace is Google-like in its slowness. But behind the scenes, data reigns supreme, and dictates whether a product is scrapped, implemented with a twist, or then reshaped anew. Refill the popcorn. This will take a while.
3 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Google officials aren't losing any sleep over TripAdvisor spending a few million dollars less on paid search, but TripAdvisor's pullback, as well as similar moves by other large travel players, symbolizes a changing advertising climate and a long-term challenge.
3 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
TripAdvisor faces a quandary: It needs to have an alternative accommodations business to round out its hotel offerings, but rentals revenue declined and slowed the otherwise-positive trajectory of its non-hotels segment. While TripAdvisor is a market leader in experiences and restaurants, its rentals business is muddying up the works.
3 months ago
Jason Clampet, Skift
Anthony Bourdain's impact on travel and food really can't be measured.
8 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Yelp's efforts to see tighter regulation of Google's business practices could have more success this time around than several years ago, when the U.S. Federal Trade Commission dropped the ball. European Union regulators have really cast the previous U.S. effort in a shameful light, and the Trump team may be more sympathetic than the Obama administration.
9 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
The tours and activities sector is not hotels 2.0. It's a massive business opportunity, though. TripAdvisor CEO Stephen Kaufer estimated it will be about half the size of the hotel sector, with similar take rates. That's indeed very substantial.
9 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Should there be TripAdvisor booths at big tourist attractions in Paris, New York, Las Vegas and Rome? It might not be a bad idea to explore to attract the business of travelers who like to book attractions offline. Would it scale? Expedia does it, but the numbers crunchers would have to figure it all out.
9 months ago
Deanna Ting, Skift
It certainly helps to have your hotels named after a wildly successful global restaurant chain, but making sure people don't only think of your brand as a place to eat can be a challenge.
11 months ago