Emerging Travel Trends in Asia Pacific - Interview with Sabre

It is almost impossible to comprehend the extent of the damage that COVID19 continues to inflict upon the global travel industry.

Airlines have been grounded, hotels closed, people around the world stranded, separated from loved ones, quarantined, lost their jobs, their livelihoods and sadly for over 647,900 people, their lives.

Normally in times of difficulty we would look at historic data to help us understand what may happen next, how things may change and how the travel and tourism sector could begin to get back to some form of normality. But, we are very much in unchartered waters and while many experts have opinions on the matter, the simple truth is, we do not know.

Most national tourist organisations (NTO) in the region, and around the world, are looking at their domestic markets to help boost tourism, even if that is a segment of the market that previously went largely untapped and unobserved.

Even cities like Hong Kong and Singapore are working hard to encourage and promote staycations, get their local and expat residents to explore parts of the cities they may not know, and treat themselves to a few nights at a luxury hotel, a spa, or a fancy restaurant or two.

There is talk of pent up demand for travel, green shoots of recovery, of vaccines, of travel corridors being opened, and airlines gradually starting to resume operations. But is all that just the industry being optimistic, or are people really ready to travel again?

To answer that question, and many, many more, Steven Howard of TravelNewsAsia.com interviewed Mr. Frank Trampert, Managing Director & Chief Commercial Officer, EMEA & APAC, Sabre Hospitality Solutions, and Mr. Todd Arthur, Vice President Agency Sales - Asia Pacific, Sabre Travel Solutions.

In this interview, filmed over the internet on 24 July 2020, we discuss what bookings are coming through the Sabre system, what trends the company is seeing, how hotels and airlines should be pricing themselves in this time of crisis, what Sabre is doing to help hotels and airlines in the region and how Sabre itself has been affected by COVID19.

We also discuss, hotel distribution, GDS pricing, whether labels of cleanliness for hotels matter, as well as the results of the recent Asia Pacific Travel Sentiment survey that Sabre conducted in the region. All that and much, much more in the video and podcast below.

Emerging Travel Trends in Asia Pacific - Interview with Frank Trampert and Todd Arthur of Sabre

PODCAST

Editor's note: My apologies that the audio and visual quality in this video interview are not up to the same HD quality that they normally would be. This is the fifth in a series of video interviews conducted over the internet. Hopefully it won't be too long until we are once again conducting exclusive video interviews in person, but for now we have to make do with what we have. Thank you.

See also: Luxury Yacht Sales and Charters in Thailand - Interview with Simpson Marine, Emerging Travel Trends in Asia Pacific - Interview with Frank Trampert and Todd Arthur of Sabre, Belmond Hotels in Asia Pacific - Interview with Iain Langridge, MD, How's Business in Siem Reap? Interview with GM of Courtyard by Marriott, Ms. Ashley Lai, How's Business in Myanmar? Interview with Torsten Edens, SVP of Memories Group, Churning a Dream into Reality - Interview with CEO of Laos Buffalo Dairy, Susie Martin and Airports, Air Travel and COVID19 - Exclusive Interview with SITA's President of Asia Pacific, Sumesh Patel.

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