Skift Take
Most of the travel brainiacs we consulted feel that HotelTonight has an uphill battle ahead, but as they say in baseball, that's why they play the games. In other words, maybe they're wrong, and HotelTonight will have the right stuff to persevere. The entire travel industry is watching.
HotelTonight burst on the scene nearly seven years ago as a unique and exquisite mobile- and tonight-only hotel booking app that spawned a host of competitors — startups and major players among them — all over the world.
Skift tech editor Sean O'Neill traced HotelTonight's evolution here, including its latest pivot into a hotel-booking service that enables guests to book hotels 100 days in advance.
Sam Shank, HotelTonight co-founder and CEO, posted a Reuters story on LinkedIn the other day that pointed out that the startup would now have to go head to head with Expedia and Booking.com.
Shank wrote: "Proud of the HotelTonight team and their relentless quest to reinvent the online travel agency for the mobile era. Great things ahead!"
Rock, Paper, Scissors
But will HotelTonight wither at the prospect of directly competing with the Priceline Group and Expedia, which collectively spent roughly $6.5 billion on advertising in 2016, and is increasing that spend this year?
Will HotelTonight run into a brick wall on the customer acquisition front as Hipmunk did, and end up with an underwhelming exit for investors as Hipmunk did in 2016 as a tuck-in buy for SAP/Concur?
Shank argues that HotelTonight's mobile advantages will trump that marketing spend, and that curation beats inventory comprehensiveness. The latter has been a signature plank in the growth of online travel companies until now.
HotelTonight's prospects are hotly debated across the travel industry, and Skift reached out to assorted travel-industry brainiacs to weigh in with their ideas on what's ahead for HotelTonight. One of the things we asked them, too, was whether they thought there were parallels for HotelTonight in Hipmunk's exit, which is believed to have been for less than what its venture capitalist partners invested.
Here's what the travel intelligentsia said:
Adam Goldstein, Hipmunk CEO
Adam Goldstein: "Competition is tough in online travel. Every company needs to look carefully at how it can gain reach. In the past, we did it by expanding our verticals and platforms; now we're expanding our audience to small businesses with Concur Hipmunk."
Paul English, co-founder Kayak and Lola
Paul English: "One of the most brilliant things about HotelTonight is their name — it got them traction. I think they will have challenges stretching that brand to 100 days."
Asked why HotelTonight would have trouble transitioning to a 100-day booking window, English added:
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