LONDON – WTM 2013 – REPORT: MEAPAC (Middle East and Asia Pacific) remains the fastest growing region for Hotelbeds as a destination and source market, with Thailand as the best-selling destination.
PALMA, LONDON – WTM 2013 – Hotelbeds, the global accommodation wholesaler, announces over 20% sales growth forecast for 2013 and its future plans at World Travel Market in London from 04-07 November, 2013.
At the event, the company announced the following highlights for 2013:
- 1.8 billion euros forecast in sales for 2013
- 60,000 hotels available for clients on hotelbeds.com
- 1.5 billion online accommodation searches per month achieved on hotelbeds.com
MEAPAC (Middle East and Asia Pacific) remains the fastest growing region for Hotelbeds as a destination and source market, with Thailand as the best-selling destination. It is followed by Malaysia, one of the fastest selling countries this year, which has achieved 74% growth. Philippines, Taiwan and Japan also registered triple digit growth as destinations.
Spain remains the best-selling destination for Hotelbeds in Europe. In the Mediterranean, Greece (58%) and Tunisia (55%) are the fastest growing destinations in comparison with the previous year.
For the Americas, the USA is the top destination for customers, with Brazil as the fastest growing destination for 2013 up 55%.
Additional highlights for Hotelbeds in 2013 include:
- Expanding Liberate, its pay at hotel model, in new markets, under a direct payment solution. This system offers different benefits for online distributors, as a significant reduction of operating costs and a no credit limit.
- New client relationship centers launched in Europe, North America and LATAM (currently implementing the fourth in Asia) providing one point of contact and 24/7 service. The centers dealt with 1.7 million customer requests in 2013.
- Significant growth in XML connections (+50%) linking Hotelbeds inventory and third party booking systems.
- Growing Hotelbeds’ Activities, Transfers and Experiences business now targeting all customer segments an area in which the company expects fast growth in future years.
Carlos Munoz, Managing Director, Hotelbeds, commented: “We have had another very successful year continuing to build on our strong global presence and leading market position whilst maintaining our double digit growth rates. We continue to increase our presence globally expanding in the source markets and destinations of Americas, Asia and Africa. For the next years we are focused on becoming the most forward thinking player in travel distribution developing our outstanding product offering, our best in class technology platform, hotelbeds.com, and our leadership position.”
Photo caption: Carlos Munoz, Managing Director, Hotelbeds.
Vicky is the co-founder of TravelDailyNews Media Network where she is the Editor-in Chief. She is also responsible for the daily operation and the financial policy. She holds a Bachelor's degree in Tourism Business Administration from the Technical University of Athens and a Master in Business Administration (MBA) from the University of Wales.
She has many years of both academic and industrial experience within the travel industry. She has written/edited numerous articles in various tourism magazines.
