Choice Hotels dumped its CEO. Patrick Pacious is out. That’s the headline that matters today. No fanfare. Just a change at the top while the rest of the industry tries to figure out where the ground is shaking.
Asia’s New Brand War
Generational shifts are tearing up the playbook in Asia. Andrew Langdon, Accor’s chief development officer, broke it down at Skift Asia Forum 26. He sees brands converting faster than ever. Mid-scale and economy hotels? They’re the ones actually driving growth.
Competition is rising. Old models are crumbling. If you aren’t adapting your brand conversion strategy now, you’re already behind.
Airbnb Enters the Ring
Airbnb launched rental cars. Big surprise to some maybe. Not really.
Their annual Summer Release wasn’t one bold bet. It was a scatter shot. Updates. Additions. Small moves that land right in the middle of Expedia and Booking’s turf. This isn’t side-hustle experimentation. This is direct confrontation with the legacy OTAs. They are stepping into the fire.
Friction is no longer a bug. It is the product.
The Myth of Smoothness
We spent twenty years trying to remove every bump in the road. The travel industry assumed “frictionless” was the holy grail. The AI era is here to correct that record. Some of that friction was load-bearing. It kept things honest. It slowed the machine down just enough.
What happens when there’s no pause? Do we stop thinking about where we are going?
Rakuten Comes for Your Stays
Americans already use Rakuten for cashback. Thousands of them. They don’t always know it belongs to Japan’s tech giant.
Now Rakuten Travel wants that audience. They want those cashback shoppers to become hotel guests. It’s a US push built on an existing habit. Sneaky. Effective. And entirely focused on converting retail clicks into check-ins.
