Airbnb came at the hotel industry with a mallet when it went from a startup (in 2008) to a booming global business (it really started to blow up in the late 2010s). The philosophy? Live like a local. Discover quirky joints. Have a unique stay. It was even cheaper (in many cases), too.
But like how Instagram used to be quiet and quirky and is now a mainstream 21st-century artery we’re all addicted to shooting up, could travellers now be waking up and stopping guzzling the marketing when it comes to Airbnb? The pandemic hit the entire travel industry hard.
During the tightest pinch, when people were (particularly here in Australia) unable to travel overseas (or in many cases even interstate) Airbnb was popular – rather than risk staying in a hotel where you could catch COVID from 100s of other people, travellers would book self-contained Airbnbs for themselves and their families and significantly reduce their chances of contracting the spicy cough.
However, now that the focus of the news cycle has shifted away from COVID and toward Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and many individuals have been completely vaccinated against COVID (or have had COVID and recovered), it may be time for travelers to rekindle an old flame: hotels.
Not only did the pandemic provide a silver lining for hotel restaurants (by scaring people away from venturing out into the street in search of 'unique' food), but now that the pandemic has passed, some frequent American travelers are recalling the benefits of hotels and questioning the benefits of Airbnb (given that its prices, in many cases, now rival hotels').
Though this is unlikely to bring Airbnb's empire crashing down in 2022, it's intriguing to consider how travel demographics are changing.
‘When I ask this, I'm being serious,’ Jackson wrote. ‘How come you still prefer AirBnB to hotels?’ Prices are no longer as low as they once were; they are now comparable to hotel rates.’
He also mentioned that hotels offer housekeeping, room service, fresh towels, and (in his opinion) superior service, as well as ‘no cleanup costs’ and ‘no surprise guests.’
He also told a story of a night when he had an unexpected visitor in his Airbnb.
Surprise guests’ means exactly that…’ he responded to one Twitter user. ‘Like what happened to me during my first (and ONLY) Airbnb stay I had the house to myself; a friend of the owner had access to his home & just casually strolled through while I was there I told the owner & Airbnb…nothing was done about it.’
Commenters on his Tweet added that further benefits of hotels are that you are less likely to find creepy things like cameras or experience racism (or racist objects).
They wrote: ‘I stopped using them after a few uncomfortable experiences, including one room being in a heinously overcrowded house (about 10 guests, one bathroom) and one host who didn’t bother to tell her husband I was allowed to be sleeping in their basement suite.’
Not everyone agreed that it was so straightforward. Some sang Airbnb’s praises (saying they can be cheaper than hotels for long term stays or FIFO workers).
One Twitter user said hotels can be pretty grim too, writing: ‘After staying in a Holiday Inn Express about 7 years ago, I swore I was done with hotels. The room was less than clean and reeked of stale cigarettes even though it was non-smoking. The carpet was old and worn. No kitchen, a cramped bathroom.
