Dropbox Vs. Hotel Industry Essay

With recent economic crisis (2008), people globally tend to spend less of their money on travel. Regarding the hospitality industry, they would rather look for cheaper accommodation or room. With the crisis also affecting companies, business travelers are keener to find cheaper rooms or apartments to limit their changes.by offering cheap rents, AirBnB is offering an alternative solution to people and businesses, and is a good response to the crisis.

Airbnb, Inc. operates an online community marketplace for people to list, discover, and book accommodations worldwide via online

Listing your property on a website means that it will be managed by a property management company, commonly referred to as a rental by owner. The property management company, in this case Airbnb or Vrbo, will charge a commission, usually 10 to 50% of the rental income.

Our team chose the hotel industry in the United States for our economic analysis. The hotel business has existed since the earliest times, and has influenced the development of the economy since the founding of this country.

Another barrier for entry is the high amount of capital needed to come into the industry. In the 2013/2014 Hotel Development Cost Survey they reported that the average cost of a economy style hotel room costs $77,400, compared to a luxury hotel average around $641,00. (See table 1) Due to the high costs of quality rooms in a hotel, there is a lot of capital required to enter into the hotel industry. A lot of money is required for property, employees, and advertising to gain entrance into the industry, which provide a huge barrier of entry into the hotel industry.

Hilton Hotels is one of the biggest players in the US lodging industry. It contributes to about 9% of the total rooms in US lodging market. It has presence in over 78 countries with more than 2500 hotels. Lodging industry is highly capital intensive industry, so to reduce capital expenditure Hilton Hotels opted for self-owned Hotels as well as franchising model with the real estate owners. One of the key features of lodging industry is low switching costs for customers. There is very little margin to differentiate from the major competitors in the industry which include Marriott international, IHG, Accor etc.

TripAdvisor is the world’s largest travel site, it enables potential customers to see other opinions before they part with their cash. TripAdvisor has over 60 million visitors per month looking through over 75 million reviews of hotels and restaurants. The site operates in 30 countries worldwide making it a powerful and unstoppable force. Tripadvisor.co.uk (2013) The next review site that even comes close to TripAdvisor is booking.com with a mere 14 million reviews per month compared to the review giant of TripAdvisor.

targeted those people who would recognize and appreciate quality lodging and not those who were seeking “cheap sleep”.  Inviting potential guests or individuals who might influence visitor hotel selection to launch parties, swim parties, cocktail parties and other planned events.  Targeting supportive hospitality businesses.  Packages that supported local businesses were developed.

A lot of business travellers want to stay in well known hotels like Mariott or Hilton. Only 16% want to stay in individual hotels. So for the industry it is important to have a very good reputation. Of course the people try to get the best price for a room and most hotels have company rates which are below the normal rack rate. Also important for a booking is the location of the hotel and the bonus programs. For 26% of the guests Airline milage is important. So the hotels have to work with airline companies and they want special conditons as well.

To remain profitable, hotels must operate with around 65-70% capacity . Due to seasonality, political and economic events, some hotels are finding it difficult to maintain profitable occupancy levels and have started to provide services along multiple levels within the industry's

For all the Contract and Garbage rates the hotel should provide the basic room type with an option of upgrading by paying a little extra amount. This is not only going to help the hotel increase its revenue but also help it to tap into the entire inert consumer surplus.

The majority of the five-star hotels are controlled by foreign hotel management group while the one, two, three, and four-star hotels are mostly controlled domestically without any strong chain brand. By August 2017, the profit of five-star hotels stands at 64.83 billion yuan, four-star hotels at 2.09 billion yuan, three-star hotels at 6.13 billion yuan, two-star hotels at 0.54 billion yuan, and one-star hotels are at 0.11 billion yuan. This shows that the majority of the profit share is earned by five-star hotels. Besides the starred hotel, there are 95000 individual hotels in China market, which occupies 27% of the market share; and economy hotel for around 7000, occupies 1.9% of the market share; social inn, hostel for about 234,000, which occupies 67% of the market share. In China, the main body market is filled with non-brand individual hotels, social inn, and hostels, but their competitive power and profitability indexes are relatively weak. Economy hotels, on the other hand, in terms of economic perspective, are lying in the ascendant mode with lots of domestic brands appearing having strong competitive power and profitability indexes.

The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company operates within the upscale & luxury hotel industry. While it could be argued that Ritz-Carlton operates in the more broad and inclusive lodging industry, they offer a highly differentiated product and service and therefore find themselves operating in an exclusive industry alongside very few direct competitors, such as Four Seasons Hotels, HongKong and Shanghai Hotels, and Starwood Hotels & Resorts. Therefore when analyzing this industry I will not be including cheap hotels, motels, lodges, or inns, unless to offer potential substitutes to luxury hotels. In order to assess the attractiveness of the upscale & luxury hotel industry, an analysis of the general environment surrounding the industry must be

2. Compare and contrast the general strengths and weaknesses of large, hotel chains such as Marriot and Hilton, bed & breakfasts, and Airbnb.

Costs can vary according to the size, location and length of your stay. If you are not on a tight budget, staying at a hotel might be more enticing than spending a night at a vacation home. Unlike a vacation rental, a hotel offers more customer-oriented services such as room-keeping services and a 24 hour reception and concierge to attend to any needs you might have. Stay in a hotel and when you are back after a long day spent exploring the city, you can be sure to return to a tidied room and clean sheets.