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Posted Nov 5, 2009
Expedia announced today that they are removing booking/service fees on all travel products sold through Expedia's call centers.
Posted Oct 29, 2009
In Part Two of our Ghosts of the Internet Past interviews, we caught up with former Expedia executive Spencer Rascoff. Spencer is now the Chief Operating Officer of real estate website Zillow.com but ran hotel supplier relations during the IHG/Expedia stand-off six years ago. Prior to Exedia, Spencer and I worked together at Hotwire.com where Spencer ran the hotel side of that business and I brought him coffee and donuts.
Posted Oct 29, 2009
As we discussed earlier, all of the relevant parties to the last major public flare-up between an OTA and a major brand ( Expedia and IHG) have moved on to new challenges. However, we’ve tracked the two key witnesses down, and they both have agreed to discuss the current situation between Choice and Expedia. First, we are talked with former IHG SVP Jim Young. We’ll follow shortly with a discussion with Spencer Rascoff, former VP of Supplier Relations at Expedia, and now COO at Zillow.com
Posted Oct 20, 2009
Choice Hotels' CEO Steve Joyce just spoke with Hotels Magazine about the current issues at hand - taking the fight into the streets.
Posted Oct 20, 2009
Hotels Magazine just broke a nice story on a squabble that has erupted between Choice and Expedia that is eerily reminiscent of a fight between Expedia and IHG several years ago.
Posted Aug 21, 2009
Hotels.com has a new look! A long over-do re-do of Hotels.com has cleaned up the user interface and toned down the jarring red of the old site. It appears to only be running on certain servers thus far so you may need to visit a few times before you get the new site.
Posted Jul 6, 2009
Dave Litman and Bob Diener, expired non-competes in hand, have been toying around for a few months with a new site - the somewhat awkwardly named roomvalues.com. For those of you who have only known Hotels.com as a part of Expedia (or IAC), Dave and Bob were the original founders of Hotels.com.
Last week, according to DN Journal (a website which tracks the buying and selling of domains) www.getaroom.com was sold at sedo.com for $30,000.
Posted Apr 28, 2009
Executives at Delta and United recently singled out online travel agencies for providing less value than other distributors, namely corporate travel management companies, and suggested that one day OTAs should pay for access to fares and inventory. Asked to respond, officials with Expedia and Travelocity chose their words carefully and an Orbitz spokesman referred me to the Interactive Travel Services Association trade group
Posted Apr 8, 2009
Last seen trying but failing to avert what became apparently the largest bankruptcy and liquidation by a modern travel management company, former Total Travel Management CEO Linda Lossing (previously Linda Garback) recently joined Egencia (formerly Expedia Corporate Travel) as a global sales manager in Tampa, Fla. Total Travel Management dba Global Experts in Travel ceased operations in May 2007.
Posted Mar 23, 2009
Expedia last week said its European president and a member of the board of directors resigned and was replaced by José Antonio Tazón, who is non-executive chairman of the board at Amadeus IT Group. He was appointed Amadeus chairman in January after a November announcement said he would pass the president and CEO post to David Jones.
According to an Expedia filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the departing Expedia executive, Simon Breakwell, revealed his "intention to resign" as an Expedia board member on March 17 "effective upon the election of his successor." Expedia elected Tazón two days later. "Breakwell confirmed that his resignation was not due to a disagreement with the company on any matter relating to the company’s operations, policies or practices," according to the filing.
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