Hospitality management platform Cloudbeds has found travellers were booking accommodation further in advance in 2023 across all regions, except in North America. The findings, revealed in Cloudbeds’ 2024 ‘State of Independent Lodging Report’, indicate that the average booking window – i.e. the number of days prior to arrival when travellers reserve a room – increased relative to the previous three years in Europe, LATAM and the Asia-Pacific region.
Here’s the scenario: Imagine you run a lodging business and the news just dropped. Taylor Swift is coming to town! A surge of Swifties are impending. Your competitors are already upping their nightly rates. You’ve got roughly half an hour to decide what average daily rate ought to be for your soon-to-be-sold-out room inventory. Your average revenue management platform can make an algorithmic guess on what you ought to charge, based upon historical data plus whatever information other users on the platform chose to disclose. Is it a crime to click that tab?