Choice Hotels International has yet to see a pick up in corporate bookings demand, and expects corporate negotiated rates to remain flat in 2010, according to CFO David White, speaking during an investor conference call last week.
Expedia (EXPE) and Choice Hotels (CHH) tonight
announced they have signed a new, long-term deal that will return Choice's inventory to Expedia's global family of websites including Expedia and Hotels.com. The three-year term is even included in the press release but maybe that is standard for a deal negotiated in the press.
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.
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
Choice Hotels' CEO Steve Joyce just spoke with
Hotels Magazine about the current issues at hand - taking the fight into the streets.
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.
