Brian Chesky Says Airbnb Won’t Mix Homes and Hotels — That’s ‘Pre-AI’ Design
Photo Caption: A room at the Martigny Boutique Hotel in Switzerland. Source: Martigny Boutique Hotel.
Skift Take
Airbnb's Chesky is nothing if not ambitious. Given that people's preferences can change at any moment, the ability to serve customers with only a hotel or home, depending what they need in that instant, seems a long way off, even with agentic AI.
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky characterized the way rival online travel agencies present hotel and homes search results either as co-mingled or with separate tabs as a "pre-AI" way of doing things.
Chesky said during the company's first-quarter earnings call that Airbnb will use personalization to only show customers the type of properties they are looking for.
"There are people that only want to book hotels. They should only see a hotel. There are people that only want to book a home. They should only see a home," Chesky said.
He said Airbnb can deliver this because everyone booking on Airbnb has a verified identity and an account; you can't book as a guest. That way Airbnb will know their booking patterns and history.
"I think the ultimate paradigm is not this tab versus co-mingle inventory," Chesky said. "I believe that's a pre-AI paradigm. I think a post-AI paradigm that we're moving towards �
