MGM Resorts Boss Sees Gains From Marriott Loyalty Tie-up

Spirit Airlines has just announced that it is eliminating flight change and cancellation fees, effective immediately, addressing a common frustration among air travelers. This new policy arrives mere days after fellow low-cost carrier Frontier Airlines made a similar announcement, signaling an overall shift in strategy among budget airlines.  

Good morning from Skift. It’s Tuesday, May 21. Here’s what you need to know about the business of travel today.

Marriott and Hilton appear to be neck-and-neck in the race to expand their footprints and loyalty programs. But if you look at the more important metric of fees earned for services they provided hotel owners, you’ll see Marriott far ahead.

Frontier Airlines is changing the structure of its pricing scheme and getting rid of change fees for most of its fare classes, as part of a wider effort to revitalize its brand, which has been struggling to turn a profit in recent years. 

Since the pandemic, airlines have reported record results quarter after quarter. International and premium travel have been the main drivers. But in the most recent quarter, airlines got a big boost from a segment many thought was long gone: business travel. 

Welcome back to another episode of the TravelPulse Podcast!

Walt Disney World Resort and its affiliated parks are striking back against one of the most egregious scams ever known.

Wyndham Hotels & Resorts expanded its all-inclusive resort portfolio Tuesday through a new alliance with Decameron All Inclusive Hotels & Resorts.

Much of Challengers’ runtime not spent on a tennis court goes down in a suite and lobby bar at an unnamed luxury New Rochelle hotel. (The film was shot in Boston.) While the techno-pulsing tennis piece of erotica never establishes whether or not these lodgings have a place to play on the premises, there are allusions to sports power couple Tashi and Art Donaldson’s (Zendaya and Mike Faist, respectively) preferred vacation destinations when off the clock. Considering the former’s clinging obsession with the game, and use of the latter as her proxy (she cannot play following an injury), it would be difficult to imagine tennis isn’t somehow involved.

The sun-drenched sepia photograph shows a dapper European, handkerchief in pocket, cigarette in hand, sitting among a row of men dressed in bisht and keffiyeh. The moment was captured during Jacques Cartier's first visit to the Persian Gulf in 1911, on his way back to London from Delhi—part of a sales trip encouraged by his father, Alfred, then the head of Cartier. The decline of the Ottoman Empire and the 1905 Persian Constitutional Revolution had flooded Europe's artistic centers with new influences, forging an aesthetic then known as “the Muslim arts.” Eager to learn more, Jacques spent four months traveling throughout Asia and the Middle East, rifling through bazaars and emporiums and mixing with high society.

Minister of Tourism, Hon. Edmund Bartlett has expressed his excitement about the recent developments within the Jamaican tourism industry as Catalonia Hotels & Resorts yesterday (May 7) announced its purchase of the Holiday Inn Resort, Montego Bay from East Bay Management Company Limited, led by prominent Jamaican businessman Kevin Hendrickson. Minister Bartlett celebrated the move by Catalonia, a respected international hospitality brand, as a strong signal of confidence in Jamaica’s tourism sector and a potential trigger for further investments.

RX UK is pleased to announce the appointment of Jonathan Heastie as Portfolio Director of its Travel sector. In his new role, Jonathan will lead the strategic development and growth of RX UK’s portfolio of travel brands: World Travel Market WTM and Arabian Travel Market ATM.