Priceline doesn’t appreciate direct booking campaigns

Priceline’s CEO prefers hotels not to offer lower prices on their own websites because their listings on Booking will not convert as well as they should. Imagine that.

Priceline Group CEO ‘Doesn’t Appreciate’ Hotel Chains’ Direct-Booking Moves

Priceline Group CEO Darren Huston isn't happy that chains such as Hilton Worldwide are offering consumers lower rates on their sites than they give to online travel agencies.

“I don’t appreciate some of the actions that are taken on a chain level sometimes … ” Huston said during Priceline’s fourth quarter earnings call February 17.
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The comments came in response to a question about Hilton Worldwide getting more aggressive in its marketing and chains becoming more stingy in giving sites such as Priceline’s Booking.com last-room availability.

Hilton recently launched a $1.3 million television campaign to promote direct bookings called Stop Clicking Around.

Meanwhile Booking .com is adding properties like crazy in an attempt to capture every accommodation market in the world including hotels, hostels, apartment rentals, vacation homes, and even igloos.

Booking.com is still adding lots of properties in Europe, although they are smaller properties, Huston said.

For example, Booking.com is adding 100 properties per day in Italy, Huston said, although most have a small number of rooms.

In China, the Priceline Group added nearly 30,000 properties in 2015, bringing its total to 35,000.

India “seems to have unending potential for us,” Huston said.

One day in the future the Priceline Group will have relationships with virtually all the hotels in the world, he said, but smaller properties, including apartments and shared rooms, will have an almost unlimited supply, Huston said.

“That space is growing faster than our core business,” Huston said.