[Sigia-l] Homunculus Wanted: Flight Booking Interface Behaviour

[Listera]

T. Karsjens:

> Which, to me, means that the travel agents of the world are a much larger
> percentage of the user base for travel sites than joe public, considering
> the percentage of business travel versus all others.

I wouldn't look at it that way at all.

Travel agents generate probably about 3/4 of all airline tickets in the
U.S.  I'd say about 1/5 of air tickets are done through the online sites.
That's one metric.

But the number of travel agents is definitively on the decline. Commissions
to small agencies have been eliminated, they now charge a service fee, which
reduces their volume and puts their computer access contracts with airlines
in jeopardy. 

The 800lb gorilla here is Orbitz (the 'cartel' of five of the six major
airlines carrying 3/4 of all US passengers), offering online-only low fare
tickets that are generally not available to travel agents. Orbitz is an
endplay to squeeze the other big two sites, Travelocity and Expedia. Can we
spell the word 'consolidation'?

And that's just the business model issues in a nutshell. Trust me, the top
online travel sites were *not* built for business travel agents.

There are tens of millions of Joes Public with online access and, dare I
say, they are not being adequately served, which can only mean an
opportunity.

What I did find out during my civilian 'travels' in the travel industry is
that taking advantage of that opportunity is very difficult without a
comprehensive end-to-end program (at the scale of Orbitz), hence my
references to iTMS, which did it in the music biz.

Ziya
Nullius in Verba