INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
With the globalized world going into partial or complete lock down over the Covid-19 pandemic, startups in the travel sector are facing a
huge stress test and immediate disruption to business as usual as public health concern spirals and entire populations are encouraged or
even forced not to travel.The traditional travel hub of Europe has emerged as a secondary hotspot for the virus, after SARS-CoV-2 first
emerged in China late last year.Italy, France and Spain have all reported thousands of cases apiece, with the latter declaring a state of
Several other EU countries have also implemented varying quarantine measures
More lockdowns are expected in the coming weeks.In a further development, US President Trump sent shockwaves through EU institutions earlier
this week by unilaterally announcing a 30-day ban on travel from most countries in the bloc.Today the European Commission came out with its
sector.Berlin-based GetYourGuide, which has built a marketplace selling sightseeing tours and other travel experiences, and last year bagged
a rise in customer service demand as people with existing travel plans seek to get in touch to cancel or reschedule trips.As of this week
GetYourGuide said bookings for new experiences are down nearly 50% globally vs its demand forecasts for the past two weeks
While customer service enquiries have tripled in the past two weeks, and its global cancellation rate has ticked up by 20%
All of the European countries seem to be in lockdown
France and Spain have recently followed
The UK has been more stable but seems to follow the same course now
Though co-founder and CEO Avi Meir is braced for further drops if more of the West goes into lockdown forcing more companies to scrap
South Korea, Hong Kong and China down north of 95%
to the usual booking window
allows the users to cancel or change for any reason and if they do they get at least 90% of the money back
And FlexiPerk really plugs this gap because it allows you to book now for September knowing that if you have to change your plans you can do
looming crunch via their Asian business
If you go under 24 hours you actually get a gift coupon so you can rebook of the full value in the future
So we are doing quite a bit in order to make sure that they survive and that they get the revenue through our platform that they
We believe that a lot of players will go bust
And I think if you look at a ten year timespan even this corona crisis will just be a small dip in a growth curve
Of not really having a 2020 budget anymore
So we can really double down on significantly improving the product for our customer and that means giving a better search and discovery
travel is never going to go down
out the demand will grow even faster
And we want to be ready for that
All the underlying architecture, campaign structures, whatever data flows were not perfect before, product messaging etc
concentrating on business stability and figuring out where to invest and where to pull back during unusual times.On the customer support
protect safety regulations? Trigger points
Sign ups are actually dramatically up
plunging sales to direct attention on product
to provide for free for all its users for the next three months
launched in partnership with medical and travel security company, International SoS, to help companies not only track where in the world
their employees are but ensure they have the medical or other crisis expertise support available should the worst happen off-site
We have a good cash position, great team
We just think our culture is much stronger when people are physically in the same space and we switched from nobody does remote work to 100%
aggressively enough [to Covid-19]
And it puts a lot of stress on public health systems
So I personally anticipate there will be a very long lockdown in a lot of countries
And there will be only a very slow recovery
My biggest wish for the next couple of weeks will be that employees continue to be healthy, safe and continue to be able to work and
full! Like not even 20% lower
We had to make a reservation to get a table etc
So unless governments, in a very coordinated way, shut down borders for a period of 4-6 weeks so everybody goes into isolation in one go and
the question of whether there will be a lasting impact on the travel market as the pandemic undoes global supply chains and routines, Shaam
So I think the answer to that largely depends on how co-ordinated and how quickly we can contain
meanwhile, with so many businesses getting au fait with virtual meetings and videoconferencing tools, the coronavirus crisis could also have
Because companies spend $1.6TR a year on business travel
carbon offset offering it launched earlier this month
on what harm you do is not good enough
