Three Calls, One Message: Demand Is Accelerating

Ben: Morning and welcome to your structure mental bulletin on the 7th of August. So quite an interesting one today, and this is kind of a story that we've been covering this week is that we've had loads of booking data and loads of earnings data come from booking.com Airbnb and as well as Expedia. So I just wanted to dive into that because the main story here is that demand is accelerating. So to dive into it on Wednesday, Airbnb posted a record quarter. So the revenue was up. 3.6 billion dollars up 17% year on year. Nights booked up 10% and accelerating from the first quarter, not slowing. Gross booking value 27.2 billion, up 16%, and the company raised its full year outlook to at least mid teens revenue growth. For European operators, this is what really matters. Within all of this context, is the origin nights accelerated in the UK and France specifically. Two of the continent's biggest feeder markets. Airbnb wasn't alone. Obviously, on Tuesday, we reported about booking booking its holdings. But to recap night, their room nights were up 5%, with Europe recovering fastest from early summer disruption. Domestic room nights. Up high single digits, alternative accommodation grew four percent and now sits roughly 37 of booking.com's room nice. And the CEO Glenn Frogel said he wants that to quote a lot higher. So expect the platform to keep leaning into our market into rentals. Now Expedia followed on from Wednesday. Gross bookings up 12 to 33.9 billion. And another raised outlook. Three majors, one week, three raised guidances. Now, this is for all the operators. Run the maths on Airbnb numbers, and the platform kept roughly 13 cents of every book dollar. Now that's not new, but a record demand pipeline is exactly when channel mix compounds. Every guest an OTA sends you this summer is a guest you can rebook direct next year. Capture by email at check-in, not at a discount at checkout. The second half demand backdrop just got confirmed by the three companies with the best forward booking data in travel. And the strength is domestic and European. That supports your rates, it supports your minimum stays and it means the busiest weeks of the year are also your biggest direct booking harvest. So strong demand is when you build your direct channel, or weak demand is when you wish you had, right? So that's your Friday bulletin. Have an amazing weekend and I'll see you Monday. Thanks for watching.