EDITOR'S COMMENT
• Chip Conley has a had a unique career in hospitality. After founding and selling the Joie de Vivre boutique hotel chain, he joined Airbnb as an in-house mentor to the company's founders. Chesky and co referred to Conley as "the modern elder", defined as someone who is "as curious as they are wise". His experiences of being twice the age of the average Airbnb employee have been the inspiration for his latest project - the Modern Elder Academy, a mix of luxury hospitality and education about the mid-life journey.
Conley keeps a close eye on the short-term rental sector and has some interesting predictions. The future, he thinks, is about entrepreneurship. "Innovation will come from small companies and individuals who are brave enough to try things, even if they sound crazy. Homesharing is a good case in point - there were a lot of opportunities for the major hotel brands to buy Airbnb a long time ago. They should have done it but they didn't, partly because they didn't understand it," he says.
He's proud of Airbnb's adoption of a hospitality ethos: "When I joined I was worried if Airbnb's guest satisfaction levels could be as high as they are in hotels. When I joined it was low. But when I left it was actually substantially higher than the average Net Promoter Score for hotels. And the people who were providing the service were not even out employees, but they were delivering, on average, to a level that was better than the employees in a hotel."
And Airbnb's future, says Conley, is about customisation: "Airbnb's greatest opportunity, given it's a data company, much more so than Marriott, Booking.com or Expedia, is to become "a lifestyle concierge - a curator of lifestyles".
"It has so many data points, both from the listings and the experiences platform. So it knows not only what sort of accommodation people have booked in the past but also what experiences they've had, plus they've filled out a one-minute questionnaire about their tastes. All of a sudden, once you've booked your listing, there's a week long itinerary for you - because we know you love jazz, you're vegetarian, you like doing yoga, you're fascinated by French history and you love modern art and architecture. Guess what? Here's the plan for you. That is not too far in the future, that kind of customisation is coming," says Conley.
Click here to listen to the full, very entertaining, and far-ranging interview.
Scroll down for the latest industry news.
• Please click here if you have a story you want us to tell the industry, or would like to be considered for a feature, podcast or webinar.
For more information and sponsorship / creative solutions advice, contact us at info@internationalhospitality.media.
