Oct 15, 2021 - Economy
The coming vacation spike
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Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky foresees a travel spike at year's end as workers cash in a flood of use-it-or-lose-it paid time off.
Driving the news: "We're going to be entering ... a new golden age of travel, where suddenly people ... have a record accrual of PTO and they've been landlocked," Chesky told me during a wide-ranging interview for "Axios on HBO."
Chesky shared exclusive Airbnb polling of 7,500 consumers in five big markets — U.S., Mexico, U.K., France, Australia — from Sept. 20-26.
- The most interesting finding: Around half of people are in danger of losing PTO by year's end.
A data point on flexible work: 64% of people polled by Airbnb said they're interested in living away from the company, then traveling to the office occasionally.
- Remote work is turning out to be Airbnb's friend: People are booking three-or four-day weekends, then working from the Airbnb on, say, Friday or Monday. And they can work all summer from an Airbnb.
- Chesky said half of Airbnb business now consists of stays longer than a week. A fifth of the business comes from stays longer than a month.
