Travel Trends

Founding V Australia Executive General Manager Scott Swift left the Virgin Blue group last week after a restructure instigated by new Virgin boss John Borghetti.V Australia has been a financial disaster since inception and Borghetti recently revealed that the airline will abandon routes such as Phuket and Fiji.  He also stripped V Australia of its operational independence and the carrier is now under the control of Virgin Blue's Chief Operating Officer, Andrew David, who has announced he will also be leaving the company by the end of this year.

The dismantling of Roamfree continues with the sale by  (relatively) new owner Tourism Holdings of channel management business Roamfree Advance to Bryan Frawley, for whom it's case of "back to the future". That's because Frawley developed a channel management product called ResOnline he sold to Roamfree in 2004. Roamfree subsequently redeveloped and rebranded it, first as Last Minute Manager, later as Roamfree Advanced. Frawley, who was also involved with the Breakfree apartment management business, will reviving the channel management product as … ResOnline. Tourism Holdings CEO David Oliver said he wants to concentrate on the Bookeasy booking engine and the company's travel websites including Roamfree.com.

RECORD growth in international travel has sparked an unprecedented surge in the number of Australian passport holders. One in two (49%) Aussies now has a passport, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, an increase of 16% over the previous year. It reflects the growing tendency of Australians to holiday overseas rather than domestically. While this figure is well ahead of the United States (25%) it seriously lags European countries such as Germany with 90% passport ownership.

News today that TripAdvisor is now the world's most popular travel website, according to comScore Data, with 35 million unique visitors each month.

That's a couple of million more than the next biggest, Expedia, which in a neat piece of business actually owns TripAdvisor.

Ergo, websites owned by Expedia, based in Seattle, Washington, also the home of Microsoft and Boeing, dominate global web travel traffic.

So has internet globalisation become Americanisation? More …

Falls Creek 14 July 2010

The snow has finally started falling on the Australian ski fields – and not a moment too soon.

It was looking dire. 

Compare this image taken at Falls Creek  today with Monday's picture. Christmas in July.

Fall Creek 12 July 2010

TOUGH start to the Aussie ski season with virtually no natural snow. Check out the ski cam image taken this morning at Falls Creek. Looks like hiking is in order for the school holiday crowds. Today's Falls Creek ski report claimed a snow depth of 15cm and described surface conditions as 'marginal'. Luckily for everyone, there's snow in the forecast.

Watching TV last night in a mild coma after the 30 hour hike home from Greece, my 9yo son and I started talking about advertising after an ad for toilet paper came on which was all about softness, strength, realiability etc – everything except what the product actually does. Which got me thinking (via various other unmentionable products, you know which ones I mean) about tourism advertising … why does it have to be so damn literal. You know scenery shot, headline and words like "Relax on a beach, climb a mountain, immerse yourself in culture". Then I saw a full-page ad in Conde Nast Traveller for Israel with the tagline 'Tranquil Oasis' – which is definitely not my impression of the country - and realised that maybe tourism advertising isn't that literal after all. Yes, it was a long flight.

Uncrowded - Poros, July 1, 2010

ANOTHER day, another strike. This time by the transport union. In case you hadn't heard, Greece – Europe for that matter – is in a spot of bother and tourism is suffering. All across the Greek Islands (apart from the iconic Santorini) tourism operators - from ferry boat captains to cafe owners – are complaining of a slow early summer season and see little prospect of change, maybe for the next couple of years …  More …

It’s been a long time coming but Caught in the Web – the most detailed research ever conducted into Australia’s booming online accommodation sector – has just been released. More …

Sometimes it's OK to go with the pack, eschew the road less travelled and head for tourist icons like Santorini. This spectacular island in the southern Agean Sea has one of the most stunning views on earth, from the cliff-top villages across nearby islands to the setting sun, drawing tourists like bees to a honey pot. Just yesterday, there were three large cruise ships in port. Tomorrow there will be several more. This could be a bad thing. More …

Acropolis, mass tourism June, 2010

MASS tourism ain't dead despite the economy. It's alive and well at the Acropolis, Athens. Tens of thousands descended on the ancient temples overlooking Athens in oven-hot 40 degree heat today. Young, old, the very old and everything in between, toting umbrellas, waving fans, red-faced and puffing. School groups, Aussies, Americans, Canadians, French, British and Greek filing up the hill, 3-4 deep, crowding the best vantage spots, ticking the Acropolis box. More …

The recent tourism bounce looked too good to be true – and it was.  Virgin Blue today slashed its profit forecast from $80m to $20m-$40m while warning of further airfare discounting to drive demand. "We have continued to see rapid deterioration and increased volatility in the operating environment, particularly the leisure segment both domestically and internationally," the company said. "This is consistent with the weakening trend seen recently in the broader retail market as well as an unexpected decline in consumer confidence. The decline in demand has coincided with a period of increased industry capacity. We expect average fares to decrease by over 10% in line with the trend seen in recent BITRE data for discount economy fares."

Roy Morgan Research claims 9.5% – or one in ten – Australians aged 14 or more visited Qantas.com.au in the past four weeks, slightly ahead of Virgin Blue at 8.9% and Jetstar at 8.8%. These "most popoular travel website" results were derived from consumer polling and largely tally with Hitwise figures that use a different method - tracking site traffic via Internet Service Providers. Airlines dominate in both instances. Other sites that did well with Roy Morgan include Wotif.com, flightcentre.com.au, lastminute.com.au, bestflights.com.au, expedia.com.au, zuji.com.au and Stayz.com.au. Two top Hitwise travel sites that did not rank with Roy Morgan respondents were  totaltravel.com and Booking.com.

GOOD to see some aggro back in the airline industry (where have the characters gone?) with Richard Branson of Virgin getting a rise from United Airlines boss Glenn Tilton (pictured)  for suggesting the US carrier may abandon flights between the America's West Coast and Australia. "You know that we have a 'win Australia' strategy, you know that the company that predicted that we might pull off the route is having more difficulty on the route than we," Tilton said. Looks like Branson found his mark. No wonder Tilton's touchy, he is under major pressure, piloting the proposed merger between United Airlines and Continental Airlines. If successful it will create the world's biggest airline. See SMH article.

The Jetset Travelworld-Stella Travel Services merger is the greatest advertisement ever for the online travel industry. Think about it. The new Jetset-Stella entity is full of financial risk. It will comprise hundreds of retail outlets, dozens of brands, and more than 3000 people. Its margins are absurdly skinny. Jetset, for example, reported a 68% drop in gross profit to $7.3m for the six months to Dec 31 on turnover of more than $1bn. No idea what Stella did because privately owned, though lots of stories about huge debt. Management reckons new company will have market value of $440m. Now look at an online travel company Wotif.com, market capitalisation $1.2bn. Employs several hundred people, made a profit after tax of $27.6m (increase of 34%) on turnover of $562m at the same time Jetset going down the tubes. Which company? That's not a question.

Travelport, which owns the Galielo and Worldspan Global Distribution Systems, has bought Singapore-based travel search engine, Sprice.com.  "Through this acquisition, Travelport expects to deliver a much broader range of hotel options to its travel agency customers, supported by comparison features, as well as providing the technology platform for new content such as, for example, parking, events and attractions and dining," Travelport said in a statement. More …

Australian airfares are the lowest since federal transport records began in 1992. Latest figures show fares fell almost 30% since September and may fall further over winter. Tiger Airways, Jetstar and Virgin Blue are leading the charge down.

Jetset Travelworld and Stella Travel Services yesterday agreed to merge, creating a mega travel retailing and wholesaling business valued at $440m. Sounds like a lot of  money but consider this: in July 2007 publicly listed Jetset had a market capitalisation of $880m when its share price reached $3.99 (it's now about $1). Seven months later, in February 2008, CVC Asia Pacific bought 65% of Stella, including a now separate hotel division, for $409m. Combined, that's a vaulation well north of $1.2b. Where has all the money gone? That's a story for another day. Brands include Jetset, Traveworld, Harvey World Travel, Viva Holiday, Orient Pacific, Best Flights, Concorde, Qantas Holidays, QBT, Travelscene and many, many more.