Ariane Gorin has had a lot on her plate since taking over as Expedia Group CEO in May. Gorin, who recently appeared in the Skift Power Rankings as one of travel’s most powerful leaders, has had to deal with a tech migration that has resulted in a slowdown in business at some of its brands. In addition, Expedia is facing the challenge of how to rebuild its One Key loyalty program.
New Expedia CEO: Building Vrbo, Loyalty, and AI Tools
19.09.2024 - 19:47 / skift.com / Ariane Gorin
Ariane Gorin was on the Skift Global Forum stage for the first time since becoming CEO of Expedia Group. Gorin took the role on May 13 and moved to Seattle after living in London and Paris for the past 23 years.
She kicked off the final day of the forum on Thursday, her first appearance as CEO at a travel industry conference, with a discussion about the future of Vrbo, loyalty, AI, and more.
Expedia Group recently completed a tech migration that brought together its three core brands — Expedia, Hotels.com and Vrbo — and their data onto one platform. That led to some decreases in business as the company was focused on the migration.
Expedia Group’s tech migration has meant that brands can more easily share inventory. Vrbo recently added some apartments that had been listed on brand Expedia, and Expedia added homes that are listed on Vrbo.
Apartments aren’t full homes, which Vrbo has been known for, but the basic offer of the brand is staying the same — Vrbo rentals will never include an on-premises host.
The inventory expansion is among the changes Vrbo is making to add more customers after it pulled back marketing during its tech migration.
The company has also been adding comparison shopping features and rebuilding its group trip planning feature, among other changes.
Expedia Group last year folded multiple loyalty programs for Expedia, Hotels.com and Orbitz brands into a single loyalty plan called One Key.
The point of the program is to earn and spend points across the three big brands: Expedia, Vrbo and Hotels.com. It’s working well in some cases, she said: 30% of the people who shopped at Vrbo after earning points on Expedia were new customers to Vrbo, for example.
Not all regions have all three brands, however, so the company is deciding how to move forward. The company paused the rollout of the loyalty program after the U.S. and the UK.
Expedia earlier this year released Romie, a generative AI-powered tool that the company called a travel agent, concierge, and personal assistant.
That’s one of several experiments with generative AI tools that Expedia has been piloting. Others include AI to summarize reviews and to help streamline call center operations.
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