NEW YORK—U.K.-based lowcostbeds.com is making its foray into the United States, and while its Managing Director Clem Walshe is happy if hoteliers and guests consider it like a “bed bank,’’ the one thing he won’t allow is anyone thinking those beds—despite the name—are going to be found in cheap or shoddy hotels.
In business for almost a decade, lowcostbeds.com is part of lowcosttravel Group, which was launched in 2004 by Paul Evans, a well-known entrepreneur in travel operations in Europe. Evans, who serves as CEO for the Group, which also includes consumer vacation planner site lowcostholidays.com, sought to fill the gap in the marketplace when the “low-cost carriers started taking over the world on that side of the water,” according to Walshe. “He saw very clearly that the model of the traditional tour operator was very much threatened by the low-cost carriers going to routes that traditionally have been the stalwarts of the likes Falcon, Thomson, Thomas Cook. It’s what really heralded the start of the OTAs.”
Lowcosttravel Group has opened an office in Atlanta where Fred Trachtman, regional sales manager/East Coast, and Ale Alvizua, sales director/America, will oversee the anticipated growth of lowcostbeds.com in the United States. “We have an experienced team there and we’re looking forward to working with the trade,” i.e., travel agents, said Walshe. “We’re asking travel agents to include us as part of their product mix.”
Unlike Expedia.com, Hotels.com or other such sites, lowcostbeds.us is exclusive to travel agents.
Lowcostbeds’ main office is in Gatwick in the U.K., with other offices spread around Europe. Discover the World Marketing is representing lowcostbeds in the U.S.
“The main thing that our business is based on is that the consumer needs flexibility, good price, a good choice and a range of product, whether it be a one-star, quick-getaway somewhere as a base to a five-star luxury hotel for a honeymoon or special occasion. If you can provide those cornerstones to the consumer via the trade, then you’re in the game. If you can’t, your position is threatened,” said Walshe. He noted the site pulls in more than 700,000 properties that come in from some 47 different XML feeds, including Expedia, Hotelbeds, Tourico Holidays and other well-known brands and directly contracted inventory in more than 150,000 hotels. Overall, none is below two-star and three-quarters of all the properties on the site are three-star and above.
“We also have our own stock of properties that we’ve built up over the years. We have 7,500 properties where we have exclusive rates that are guaranteed to be the best in the marketplace and we have our own feeds,” said Walshe.
The executive is counting on the group’s reputation for having a good handle on technology to help advance the site with U.S. agents. “We’ve been told by the trade that one of the reasons for our growth and popularity is because our technology is reliable; it’s user friendly, it’s fast, it provides a range of hotel product and a very easy filtering process,” said Walshe. The website also is available in 13 languages.
In terms of inventory coming from the hotel side, key benefits to hotels would include access to 20,000 travel agents worldwide, a number that Walshe expects will continue to grow; product promotions via lowcostbeds’ databases and trade “flash” sales; targeted trade promotions to fit relevant markets; joint marketing opportunities to promote low-season dates and/or distressed stock; and hotels can manage their own pricing and inventory on the lowcostbeds’ extranet.
“We pull in the 47 XML feeds, but we also invite hotel partners to join us and become part of our own stock,” said Walshe. “With the global expansion we’re on now”—he expects to jump from 37 to some 90 countries by year’s end—“we’re going to have to expand our product. We already have feeds from the big players but we want to expand our own stock.”
Toward this, lowcostbeds has an exclusive team dedicated to signing up properties in the U.S. Walshe said the company already has done deals with some of the big chain players, but would not disclose which ones. He added the company also would take on hotels at the property level.
“We think we’ve a very good, mutually workable relationship with all our partners. We deal with our competitors, they deal with us. We take their XML feed, they take our XML feed. The technology will only throw up the best availability at the best price to suit what’s been put in,” he said, which is why a variety of U.S. hotels already can be found on the site.
While OTAs have proliferated, Atlanta-based Regional Sales Manager Trachtman noted small- to medium-size brick-and-mortar agencies have seen a shift in consumer attitudes regarding travel assistance. “There’s a trend with their clients who had been doing more self-help [in searching for hotels]who are now coming back, recognizing the value of the experts. And these agents are looking for a time-efficient tool to allow them to cement the relationships with the clients, and then spend time doing what they do best: educate and instruct and make memorable vacations,” he said.
“We’re constantly evolving the site all the time as well. For example, if a competitor comes in, say, with better maps, we feel a responsibility on our part to make sure [we address that so]we’re continually on the cutting edge,” said Walshe, noting it’s something everyone involved in the process of securing guests needs to consider. “The principals, whether they’re a hotel, an OTA or anyone else can’t just say, ‘Well, we’ve got them and they’re going to come back. You have to provide a level of service or some added value so the guest says, ‘I want to go back there because…’, otherwise you’re just back in the mix again the next time they travel.”