Recovering hotel room sales during the COVID-19 pandemic: lessons from OTA information using the quantile regression approach

Has COVID-19 had an impact on prices? The case of the cruise industry

“…This is an empirical study supported by an extensive database created by the authors from a leading Spanish OTA (1,644,098 prices) and can be considered a pioneering study into the variation of prices in the tourism sector, in this case specifically in the cruise industry, since COVID-19 was detected. The use of the information from an OTA has the advantage that prices of different cruise companies are homogeneous as they are provided from the same source and that OTA are a common source from which to obtain information, attract customers and book (De Pelsmacker et al 2018 ) as they are able to improve the sales in this case of the cruise companies (Guo et al 2021 ). From a methodological perspective this study uses the hedonic approach, very common in the tourism industry in this type of analysis.…”

“…It is also important that cruise passengers do not get used to lowered cabin rates as it would be difficult to sell the cabins again at higher prices when the demand is recovered, affecting profits in both the mid and long term (Kim et al 2019 ). Another way to attract customers is to provide extra security measures and to offer a clear differentiated service (Espinet et al 2021a ; Guo et al 2021 ), which include new specific services on the ship as onboard revenues represent 29% of the total (Medcruise 2021 ). From the point of view of costs, cruise companies can adjust them by identifying those more relevant and to try to optimize them so that they can improve their profits.…”

“…Another possible strategy could be to reduce their operating costs and payrolls, which represent 29.9% and 12.6%, respectively (Medcruise 2021 ), although these measures should avoid to have a negative impact on image and reputation, which at the end affect the positioning of the cruise companies (Alonso-Almeida et al 2015 ). In all cases, the image of cruise companies (Ryschka et al 2016 ), the way they communicate after a crisis (Liu et al 2016 ) and media will play a key role (Guo et al 2021 ) in the recovery of the industry.…”

“…Lin and Chen ( 2021 ) indicate that the impact of COVID-19 on hotel’s performance is different depending on the hotel characteristics: international tourist hotels with high product varieties and five-star hotels suffered a greater loss in revenue than other types of hotels, while hotels located in scenic areas and international chain hotels were less affected. Guo et al ( 2021 ) indicate that the recovery of hotels with shorter operating years, higher quality amenities and services, and better brand image, was faster during the pandemic. Moreover, the comparison between different types of cities suggests that hotels in tourism-oriented cities recovered faster than those in commerce-oriented ones.…”

“…Moreover, the comparison between different types of cities suggests that hotels in tourism-oriented cities recovered faster than those in commerce-oriented ones. Another way of increasing and speeding up the recovery from the pandemic is to consider the role of OTA and the information that they provide from suppliers, which should be continuously updated (Guo et al 2021 ).…”