For travelers who like to plan ahead and manage their costs, vacation packages represent an easy way for travelers to book a flexible combination of flight, lodging, rental car and local attractions at one rate, on one website with a few clicks of the mouse.The benefits to hotels of offering vacation packages, however, often go unrecognized:
- An average booking window that is more than double that of a standalone hotel reservation;
- An average length of stay that is more than 120 percent longer than a standalone hotel reservation;
- 50 percent fewer cancellations than standalone hotel bookings
- Increased opacity to preserve rate integrity
In Jacksonville, a market that is driven largely by its submarkets, hotels were unaccustomed to utilizing packages because they assumed they were too far from the airport for their offerings to be effective. By experimenting with the package path, one hotel ultimately grew its business by 20 percent and became one of Jacksonville’s top producers. While packages are not the lion’s share of this hotel’s business, you can be sure they’re not interested in giving up those incremental room nights either.
It’s imperative for hotels to use market-specific demand data, like that offered by Expedia market managers, to identify and address any unfulfilled demand that could be best-served with vacation package offers.
For example, if 15 percent of shoppers in a given market are looking for four-night packages, 15 percent of any area hotel’s bookings should be for four nights. If a hotel’s booking metrics don’t reflect market averages, the hotel can adjust their package offerings to capture that lucrative guest. Offering discounts on a fourth night might convert three night shoppers into a four-night guest and capture the four-night shoppers along the way.
Need help designing your package? Contact the sales staff at the Kankakee County CVB for more information.
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