Italy’s price cap on flights to Sicily and Sardinia is “illegal and unenforceable”, Ryanair group CEO Michael O’Leary told Reuters on Tuesday, adding the budget airline had lodged a complaint with the European Commission.
25.08.2023 - 13:03 / skift.com / Srividya Kalyanaraman
Occupancy is at its lowest, losses are mounting, and the company announced another round of layoffs last month. Despite this, the luxury hospitality brand Inspirato has a few wins, including a new partnership with Capital One, and a rewards program launch.
For the quarter ending June 30th, The Denver-based company posted a consolidated net loss of $47 million; its revenue totaling $84 million remained flat compared to last year.
CEO Brent Handler told analysts and shareholders Wednesday that in addition to the reduction in its portfolio and weaker occupancies, the headwinds for the quarter were travel demand leaning towards urban travel, an area that is not the company’s strong suit.
“The high-end, traditional vacation rental markets were down this summer, more than I have ever seen,” Handler said. “Nantucket, Rosemary Beach in Florida, Malibu, Hilton Head Island in South Carolina — this is where the bulk of our inventory is, and they have to do well for us.”
Inspirato announced on Tuesday that Capital One Ventures would provide the company with a $25 million convertible note. Handler added that the partnership could be beneficial to both companies with Capital One providing Inspirato the demand it needs, and in turn giving access to a membership-based travel perk to its cardholders.
Handler called it a “perfect storm” where lower demand met a mistimed strategy of portfolio growth. But since then, the company has pruned its underforming assets, removing 60 residences from its portfolio due to non-renewal and/or early terminations, resulting in a net decrease of 39 residences compared to the last quarter. As a result, controlled accommodations decreased annually by 6% to 663.
Handler told Skift in an interview after the earnings call that $25 million worth annualized lease savings from early terminations, renegotiations and non-renewals will come out of its system, and in addition to that, the company will pull out of many drive-to destinations that are oversaturated, and instead take on a few extra “underperforming properties” in destinations like Cabo and spruce them up.
“We can get out of 88% of our leases in six to 12 months,” Handler said, referring to the structure of the company’s contracts. And for the leases that the company is stuck with, it often distributes them on third-party channels at lower rates.
For 2023, Inspirato anticipates total revenue between $320 million and $340 million. The decrease in total revenue compared to prior guidance is primarily attributable to the aforementioned travel dynamics. The company anticipates a full-year 2023 adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) loss between $30 million and $45 million.
Handler noted
Italy’s price cap on flights to Sicily and Sardinia is “illegal and unenforceable”, Ryanair group CEO Michael O’Leary told Reuters on Tuesday, adding the budget airline had lodged a complaint with the European Commission.
Yanolja said this week it expected that a post-pandemic rebound in international travel will continue to boost its twin businesses of online travel sales via a superapp and software sales to hotels and other travel companies. The South Korea-based startup has made progress on both ambitions since 2011, when it received a $1.7 billion investment from the Softbank Vision Fund in a transaction that valued Yanolja at the time at approximately US$9 billion.
Ryanair on Monday posted its largest ever after-tax profit for its key summer season and said it expected very strong passenger and fare growth for years to come as customers switch from higher-cost rivals.
Saudi Arabia’s increasing focus in the tourism sector and the shift to leisure travel has brought Seera Group from the red to report the company’s first post-pandemic operating profit of $8 million in the third quarter.
Registering a record performance for the first six months of the financial year, Dubai state carrier Emirates Airline on Thursday reported a net profit of $1.08 billion for the first half of the financial year, compared to a loss of $1.6 billion for the same period last year.
Australia’s Qantas Airways Ltd raised its first-half pre-tax profit outlook on Wednesday on strong travel demand, with limits on international capacity helping boost domestic tourism, sending its shares to more than a two-year high.
Faced with lower-than expected occupancy and sluggish subscription sales, luxury travel brand Inspirato lowered its 2022 financial guidance, and transferred one-third of its salesforce and marketing personnel to new or expanded segments it is targeting, namely business travel and philanthropy.
Luxury travel subscription service Inspirato announced on Wednesday that it’s laying off 12 percent of its workforce amid its struggles with lower-than-expected occupancy and disappointing sales.
Indian carrier Vistara reported its first-ever net profit for the quarter ending December 2022, according to statement from the airline on Monday.
Inspirato, the luxury hospitality subscription brand, has cited “ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty” as it made workforce cuts and scaled back its 2022 financial outlook, yet this is at odds with the bullish commentary from other travel companies, especially as regions like Asia reopen for international travel.
Chinese conglomerate Fosun International is hoping its vacation business segment will pull it out of a slump.
Portugal’s move to end its “Golden Visa” program and curtail new short-term rental licenses will not impact the vacation rental market in the country — not in the short-term anyway.