27 September 2011

Online Travel Drags Down ARC August Numbers



Oh dear... after recovering strongly from the depths of the 1st quarter when Expedia and Orbitz suffered without the AA content, the post summer blues seem to have hit the US market for Online Travel Agency sales.

While the $$$ numbers still look good - the transactions of the OTAs are down This is starting to look like the market is going soft. While traffic growth was modest for the earlier part of the year - the GDS powered ARC transactions were down in totality. I believe we are in for a soft late 3rd and all of 4th Quarter. Next year will start soft for sure. With fuel still stubbornly high despite the significant drop in the price of oil. So hold onto your seats everyone - we are going to hit turbulence. Airlines are cutting flights. Cheers

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