May 15, 2007
 
More Hotels Designing Music In Tune With Guest Expectations
Since the advent of iPods, music is again becoming a way of life. That's according to Frank Zumbo, g.m., The Renaissance Pere Marquette Hotel in New Orleans, which uses the tagline: "Dreaming with the legends of jazz."
Music has become more portable, and from a hotel standpoint, it helps connect with guests and create the mood, Zumbo said. "It's important to program music by time of day," he said. "Music appropriate for happy hour isn't appropriate for morning. You want to create a mood, even in the fitness center."
Gone are the days of cookie-cutter elevator music, said Melanie Olivia, marketing manager for Westin Hotels & Resorts. "Our mission is to ensure that we provide our guests with personal renewal at every point of the guest experience ­ music is one component of that," she said.
According to Hotel & Motel Management the brand is working with an eMusicologist to develop playlists for its lobbies and Westinmusic.com/ Web site, which is powered by eMusic. "We really put a lot of thought into the feeling we want to evoke," Olivia said.
There are six playlist categories that are geared for different property types, so a resort and an urban hotel each would have a different vibe. Each playlist is comprised of four parts to be played depending on the time of day.
Hyatt Hotels & Resorts introduced a digital download music program that will roll out to properties throughout 2007.Each property will have a unique music library while meeting a set of music standards for the brand, said Walter Brindell, assistant v.p., rooms operations, Hyatt Hotels Corp. Different music collections are used in different spaces of the hotel, so the spa has a different mood than the lobby.
 
Southwest CEO Cites Declining Travel Demand
The chief executive of Southwest Airlines Co. said there is "growing evidence" that a slowing U.S. economy is dampening travel demand, which will make it tough for the discount carrier to achieve its earnings target for the year.
Speaking at the Bear Stearns Global Transportation Conference, Southwest Chief Executive Gary Kelly said the long-standing 15% earnings-growth target remains in place for this year. He added, however, that the Dallas-based company may be forced to reevaluate targets for 2008 and beyond if the market continues to be sluggish.
According to Associated Press, Southwest and other major carriers in recent weeks reported that first-quarter financial results pointed to a weakening environment for passenger revenue in the United States. Still, executives at some competitors, including Delta Air Lines Inc. and Houston-based Continental Airlines Inc., said at the conference Wednesday that passenger demand remained strong. They said airlines that have cut domestic capacity this year have been better able to match demand with supply than carriers that continue to grow.
 
Study: Growth Of At-Home Travel Agents Increasing Dramatically
A surprising American Society of Travel Agents (ASTA) study found the number of home-based agents is increasing dramatically while a decreasingly number of agencies are located on main streets and strip malls.
By way of comparison, in 2002, says TravelMole, 7.3% of ASTA travel agencies defined themselves as being home-based. By 2006, that number rose to 17.4%. But agencies located on main streets and in strip malls fell by 6.3% and 2.4%, during the same time frame.
The study also found that travel agencies with sales of between $5 million and $10 million make up the fastest growing segment of ASTA's membership. In 1998, 7% of ASTA members reported sales volume in this category, while in 2006 that figure rose to 10.1% for a 44.6% increase overall.
The 2006 ASTA Agency Profile report also found that the number of agencies who reported sales volumes as being either between $4 million and $4.9 million or more than $10 million has grown by 24% during the same time period.
Another trend in the study is that between 2000 and 2006, the sales mix of US travel agencies has undergone a major shift. In 2000, agencies reported well over half of their sales mix came from air sales. Six years later, that figure dropped by more than half.
 
A Growing Trend: Tourists Who Want The Comforts Of Home
For slow travelers, getting away from it all doesn't mean leaving everything familiar behind; it means re-creating some version of home wherever they go, complete with the comforts, intimacies and conveniences of everyday life.
The hum in the hospitality business these days is over home cooking, staying in nights and renting DVDs, shopping at neighborhood grocery stores and other ways to make strangers feel like locals reports Newsweek.
"It would be dumb to say that mass tourism is dead, but there's no question a major shift in travel is underway," says Julio Aramberri, professor of tourism at Drexel University. "Once the idea was to keep up with the Joneses. Now it's about keeping away from them." Rather than follow the hordes of other tourists, visitors want to blend in.
An expanding array of home-style accommodations makes that increasingly possible. Dominant brands like Marriott and Hilton are running up against all kinds of competition; in the new world of in-depth travel, anyone with a beach house, a country cottage or a pied-à-terre in the city can be a player.
The Voltaire, a three-bedroom luxury apartment in the heart of Paris, rents for $980 a night ­ a bargain considering the day rates of comparable hotels. In Rio de Janeiro, visitors can stay in the quirky Maze Inn, an 11-room bed-and-breakfast built atop a private home in the midst of a sheer-sloped favela.
 "In every single major-destination location there's a whole sub-industry in lodging that's not hotel based," says Paul Chiu, a travel analyst at the international consultancy Accenture. "For anyone with a large family, that's an attractive alternative."
At the top end are villas that come with housekeepers, cooks and kitchens fully outfitted with cutting-edge appliances ­ not to mention Wi-Fi, satellite TV, PlayStation and all the other technological toys people take for granted at home.
A week in May at the Villa sur Mer, a palace for hire on the Côte d'Azur with sweeping ocean views and an English-speaking chef, goes for a cool $35,715 on rentvillas.com. High-end destination clubs charge hefty membership fees for the use of premier homes in popular spots.
Donn Davis, CEO of Exclusive Resorts, which keeps 400 mansions around the world for money on the move, says their $350,000 membership fee is a small price to pay. "The working affluent have so little time to see their families," he says. "In order for them to relax we need to give them an environment that allows them to work."
Though purists may scoff at the refusal of today's travelers to leave their BlackBerrys behind, it's the ability to stay connected that allows them to take longer vacations to more-remote locales. "It's funny to see all these idyllic places offering wireless access, but without them they'd be lost," says Aramberri. "More and more people want to get away and relax, but they can't do without contact with the company."
 
Travel Oregon Goes Digital
BrandWeek reports Travel Oregon is tapping into the social networking phenomenon with a site that the tourism commission describes as Amazon meets eBay meets Trip Advisor.
The recently launched site actually is GoSeeOregon.com, which was developed by GoSeeTell Network, Portland, Ore. Visitors can search for recommendations, which are categorized by interests and lifestyles, from reviews submitted by travelers about places they visited along with photos and travel tips. Every reviewer can be evaluated by GoSeeOregon users who rate that person’s information on a “trustiness” scale or how trustworthy a reviewer’s posting is as graded by their peers.
“GoSeeOregon.com is more about people who visit the places than about the places that are visited by people,” said Todd Davidson, CEO of Travel Oregon. “It also allows us to build on our established track record as an innovator in the travel industry. We know of no other tourism destination that has attempted to engage travelers on this level.”
Next will be a six-week online campaign created by Wieden + Kennedy. Flash and animated banners will appear on travel-related Web sites calling attention to Oregon happenings like the UFO Festival in McMinnville and MacTarhanhan’s Pug (as in dog) Crawl in Portland.
 
NBC Universal Set To Brand Dubai Theme Park
NBC Universal has announced a licensing deal to create a Universal-branded theme park in Dubai set for a grand opening in 2010.
The $2 billion-plus project by Dubai developer Tatweer ­ dubbed Universal City Dubailand ­ will feature Universal-themed rides and attractions, as well as 4,000 hotel rooms, 100 restaurants, retail outlets, and office space and residential units, officials said. The project will be located on a 22 million-square-foot parcel in booming Dubai, a city and emirate in the United Arab Emirates.
According to BrandWeek attractions will include ones based on the films "Jurassic Park" and "King Kong." The park will be divided into four "zones," including Hollywood, Metropolis, Adventure and Cartoon zones, officials said.
 
The Fight For The High-Revenue Passenger
American Airlines is offering free on-demand video and audio entertainment for first- and business-class passengers on transcontinental flights and will test a media player on some flights between Los Angeles and Chicago.
According to MSNBC he nation's largest airline said premium customers will get free on-demand movies, music and television on handheld devices with 7-inch touch-screen monitors.
American said it began offering the devices Tuesday on Boeing 767-200 and 767-300 aircraft flying New York-Los Angeles and New York-San Francisco routes, and it will add them to Miami-San Francisco flights in June.
American and other carriers are trying to upgrade the ambiance in premium cabins during international and long domestic flights to increase brand loyalty among big-spending customers. They also hope to boost revenue by persuading coach passengers to pay a few bucks for amenities such as better entertainment.
 
Top 10 Girl Getaways
MSNBC has published a list of Girl Getaways developed by Sherman’s Travel. According to the agency you can plan a weekend with your sister, a once-in-a-lifetime trip with mom, or a bachelorette party for your best friend  – no matter the occasion, there's nothing like a girl getaway to bond women together. Their top recommendations:
  1. Art-Viewing in Florence
  2. Club-Hopping in South Beach
  3. Cooking in Provence
  4. Going Wild in Las Vegas
  5. Shopping in New York City
  6. Spirituality in Sedona
  7. Surfing in Bali
  8. Theater in London
  9. Wine-Sipping in Sonoma
  10. Yoga in Costa Rica
 
Speaking of Girl Getaways…Atlantic City Targeting Women with Packages
Atlantic City said it is seeing a change in its visitor profile with a growing number of women traveling for a weekend getaway with their friends. As billions of dollars are being poured into city-wide development, Atlantic City's hotels, casinos, restaurants and shops are catering to this demographic in the form of new packages designed for girls getaways and other female-friendly offerings.
For example, says ModernAgent, the Sheraton Atlantic City Weekday Shop and Stay takes advantage of premium outlet shopping at Atlantic City Outlets-The Walk. With Super Shoesday at Atlantic City Outlets-The Walk, available through May 19, guests can win a pair of this season's hottest shoes every Tuesday from Atlantic City Outlets-The Walk, plus a chance at Shoes for a Year and $104,000 in cash.
The Almond Coconut Tropical Decadence Package at bluemercury Resort Spa at the Tropicana Utilizing a selection of Laura Mercier products, this treatment package begins with an almond coconut sugar scrub followed by a bubble bath infused with the essence of toasted almonds and coconut.
 
Singapore Airlines Group Sees 71.6% Profit Increase
Air Transport World has reported that record revenue and the proceeds from the sale of its stakes in Singapore Aircraft Leasing Enterprise and the SIA Building helped carry Singapore Airlines Group to a stunning S$2.13 billion ($1.4 billion) profit for the fiscal year ended March 31, a 71.6% surge over the S$1.24 billion earned in the prior 12-month period.
The company credited the airline segment for driving the improved group result. Singapore Airport Terminal Services suffered a 16.8% drop in operating profit to S$153 million, SIA Engineering's operating profit fell 24.3% to S$102 million and SIA Cargo swung to a S$32 million loss from the prior year's S$174 million profit.
Full-year traffic rose 7.7% to 89.15 billion RPKs and capacity was up 2.3% to 112.54 billion ASKs as SIA took delivery of nine 777-300ERs and decommissioned five 747-400s. Load factor climbed 3.6 points to 79.2%. Yield rose 2.8% to S$0.109 and cost per ASK increased 5.3% to S$0.079.
 
Foodies Get A Taste For Online Reviews
Over a third of adults said they have researched online about a restaurant they had not visited before, according to the National Restaurant Association's 2006 research. That is up from the 13% who did in 1999 according to eMarketer.
The association's Hudson Riehle noted that "in the restaurant business, word-of-mouth publicity has always been crucial; it's just that now, with the growth of online customer reviews, diners' opinions aren't restrained to their circle of friends."
Top national sites for amateur restaurant reviewers include Citysearch, Yelp, Dinesite.com, local.Yahoo.com and Chowhound.com. Even Zagat.com, which focuses on subscription-only content, has added a free online feedback function to collect input from the average diner.
In a MediaWeek interview, marketing professor Michael Solomon said that online consumer reviews will continue to grow, although one problem needs to be controlled. "That is the ability of reviewees to slant the reviews by strategically placing their own employees or paid shills in the audience," Dr. Solomon said. "If this pernicious trend can be brought under control, our restaurant choices truly can benefit from the power of crowds."
 
European Discount Airlines Expand In USA
Trans-Atlantic airfares are sky-high for summer travel, but a number of low-fare, Europe-based carriers could offer some relief for intrepid U.S. travelers trying to cut costs says USA Today.
A handful of airlines that, for the most part, have flown under the radar of Americans' consciousness, are revving up service on this side of the Atlantic. The upside: Their fares generally are lower. They offer meals and entertainment (though sometimes for a fee). Most have premium-class compartments, which can offer even greater savings over major carriers.
The downside: They come with a lot of caveats. Because these airlines target European leisure travelers, they fly to a limited number of U.S. cities (most notably Orlando, Las Vegas and New York). Some flights are seasonal (usually May through October), and frequency varies.
Because of their limited capacity and spotty brand identity, the low-fare carriers are likely to appeal mostly to what aviation consultant Michael Boyd calls the "backpack lunatic fringe." "You might find (a deal), but you have to go out of your way to do it," he says.
 
IHG To Launch Staybridge Suites Brand In Middle East
InterContinental Hotels Group has launched its Staybridge Suites extended-stay brand across the Middle East region. Four properties are already in the pipeline and will be located in the UAE, Kuwait and Egypt says ehotelier.
The introduction of Staybridge Suites will further entrench InterContinental Hotels Group as one of the largest multi-brand hotel operators in the Middle East. It will add a new dimension to the group's product portfolio, which already boasts InterContinental, Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn and Express by Holiday Inn properties. Staybridge Suites is aimed primarily at long-stay business travellers looking for ‘more home than hotel.'
 
Hilton Expands In India As Market Demand Soars
Hilton Hotels Corp. said it will invest as much as $143 million over the next seven years in a joint venture with New Delhi-based DLF Ltd., part of giant Indian realty firm DLF Group, to help meet India's surging demand for hotel and hospitality space.
The Wall Street Journal reports the venture, DLF-Hilton Hotels, is 26%-owned by Hilton; the remainder is owned by DLF. It plans to develop 75 hotels and already has begun 10 projects in different parts of the country, including Bhubaneshwar, Kolkata, New Delhi, the technology hubs of Hyderabad and Bangalore and tourist hot spots such as Goa and Mysore.
India's hospitality sector is booming amid brisk demand from business travelers, as well as foreign and domestic tourists. India has a total of 27,000 premium rooms in its 12 largest cities; the occupancy rate in these rooms was 75% in the year ended March 31, a very high level for the industry overall, says Benaisar Jehani, an analyst at Crisil Research, a Mumbai-based corporate-research firm.
 
Boutique Hotels Sprouting Up In Asia
Boutique hotels are popping up in Asia's more cosmopolitan cities faster than construction cranes, says Newsweek.
Over the last couple of years, Hong Kong and Singapore have led the trend in the region. Now Shanghai is getting the boutique treatment, meeting the fast-growing demand among design-conscious travelers for a more intimate, personal environment.
Within the space of a few months, at least three boutique hotels ­ generally defined as having fewer than 100 rooms and a hip décor concept ­ have opened their doors. The 30-room Mansion Hotel is a renovated French-style manor with private-club décor, evoking the swinging Shanghai of the 1920s. M Suites has a sleeker, more contemporary feel, and JIA Shanghai provides home-style luxury incorporating signature furniture pieces.
"It's a very niche market, but it's growing tremendously," says Yenn Wong, the owner of JIA Boutique Hotels, which opened Hong Kong's first boutique hotel in 2004 and is now planning its third in Beijing. "For these travelers, it's no longer about just having a comfortable hotel room. They're more in tune with the beautiful things in life."
 
Study: Newspaper Sites Growing Faster Than Web Overall
The audience for newspaper web sites is growing faster percentage-wise than the Internet audience at large, according to a study commissioned by the Newspaper Association of America and released on Monday.
The study, done by Nielsen//NetRatings and reported in Media Daily, found a monthly average of 59 million people visiting Web sites in the first quarter of 2007 ­ representing 5.3% growth over the same period of 2006. Meanwhile, the pool of total Internet users in the United States grew about 2.7%.
These numbers "validate the industry's investment in digital innovation, and the ongoing attraction consumers have to newspapers online," said NAA president and CEO John F. Sturm in a statement. "Newspaper publishers have aggressively transformed their business models, continually providing ground-breaking content to consumers with their expanding digital portfolios."
 
Delta To Scale Back Domestically, Expand Internationally
Delta Air Lines Inc. will cut domestic capacity over the next several years as it focuses more attention on expanding its international service, and it has its eyes set on Asia, Chief Financial Officer Ed Bastian said Wednesday.
Bastian said at a New York investor conference that the majority of the Atlanta-based airline's international growth will be in Asia, Africa and the Middle East.
Delta, the third-largest carrier in the U.S., has long sought to gain a foothold in China says the San Diego Union-Tribune. It is banking on an “open skies” agreement being put in place to allow it to fly there.
“We are going to be expanding services to Asia,” Bastian said. He said the majority of the airline's growth in other parts of the world will be “self-funded” by redeploying assets from the domestic side to the international side.
“When I talk about growth, we are going to be doing it in a disciplined manner,” Bastian said.
 
Survey: U.S. Gambling Revenues Up 6.8%
Gambling revenues at U.S. commercial casinos rose 6.8% to a record $32.4 billion in 2006, according to a survey released Tuesday by the American Gaming Association. The survey collected data from state regulatory agencies on 460 commercial casinos in 11 states says The Boston Globe .
The casinos employed 366,197 people, up 3.2% from a year earlier, and contributed $5.2 billion in gambling taxes to state and local governments, up 5.5% from a year earlier, according to the survey.
The survey found strong growth in the 36 racetrack casinos across 11 states, which reported 16% more in gambling revenue than the previous year, or $3.6 billion. Employment at the properties rose by 30%.
American Gaming Association president Frank Fahrenkopf attributed the growth to the public's relative willingness to approve such expansion.
 
Vacation Travel 2007: What’s In, What’s Out
Worker bees are fed up with burning unused vacation days, and 59% of travelers say they intend to use at least half of their vacation time this summer ­ up from 54% in 2006, according to a new survey from TripAdvisor. And 29% say they will be taking more time off this summer than last summer.
Polling 3,000 travelers around the world, the Needham, Mass.-based company also found that people won't be calling in for messages. Some 57% say they plan to disconnect from work, and 54% will avoid returning phone calls and e-mails. About 46% will give up TV, 37% will abandon their healthy eating habits, and 30% will take a break from working out.
And, says Marketing Daily, reversing a trend toward fewer, shorter vacations, 86% overall say they will take their vacation in weeklong chunks, with 68% of Americans planning to take between one and three weeks this summer. What's more, they're not going to let a little thing like skyrocketing gas prices steal their sunshine: 79% of travelers said that the cost of fuel and rising airfares will not affect their summer travel plans. (In all, 78% expect to vacation by car, 78% by air, and 25% by boat or ferry.)
 
Open Skies Deadline Dropped From U.S.-China Talks
The U.S. government appears to be backing away from its attempts to pin down Chinese negotiators on a firm timetable for full open skies between the two nations, but in return the U.S. wants to push the Chinese to grant many more flight frequencies.
Industry sources tell Aviation Daily that the latest U.S. proposal includes a start date for open-skies discussions to begin but no end date. The Chinese had earlier offered to start these talks within five years, but the U.S. wants the start date to be May 2008. The U.S. has had to scale back its expectations in the latest round of aviation liberalization talks, but despite this, U.S. negotiators believe their new proposal will be a tough sell.
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Yahoo Travel Gets More Personal With Users And Advertisers
Yahoo has enhanced its yahoo Travel portal in order to bring users more personalized travel info destination and advertisers more effective lead generation. According to Media Daily the revamp adds both user-generated content and behavioral targeting functionality to the site's three main components ­ Trip Planner, Travel Guides, and the FareChase comparison search engine ­ in addition to improved mapping and instant-messaging capabilities.
"Overall, we're excited about pulling together all the tools, functionality and technology available to help our users get inspired for their travel plans," said Fiona Lake Waslander, director of product management for Yahoo Travel.
The portal will highlight ten individually relevant destinations in a module called "Today's Picks," with recommendations powered by both the user's activity and the behavior of similar users across the Yahoo network. A couple searching for a "romantic" weekend in Seattle, for example, will receive suggestions tagged as "romantic" by other users from Seattle.
 
Who's Paying $200,000 For A Few Minutes In Space?
The next space race is on, and this time it's for the masses.
Well, not exactly the masses, says USA Today. More like the actors, real estate magnates, hedge fund managers and well-off adventurers who can afford $200,000 or so for a quick jaunt beyond the Earth's atmosphere and several minutes of zero-gravity weightlessness.
They include actress and skin-care entrepreneur Victoria Principal, 57, who wonders what color her spacesuit will be, and Hollywood director Bryan Singer, 41, who got turned on to the idea while planning a shuttle disaster scene for his movie Superman Returns.
Among the not-so-famous is Soviet émigré Lina Borozdina-Birch, 38, who took out a second mortgage on her house to fulfill her extraterrestrial dream ­ despite her fear of flying. Space junkies George and Loretta Whitesides, both 33, plan to celebrate their honeymoon more than 70 miles above Earth.
"There's a wide range of scientists, entrepreneurs, business people and people who really have a vision of wanting to go into space and always have," says Will Whitehorn, president of Virgin Galactic, one of several private companies trying to kick-start the space tourism industry, democratize the astronaut corps and turn a profit doing so. Principal and the others have signed up with Virgin.
The company, part of flamboyant businessman Richard Branson's Virgin Group, has recruited about 200 people for 2½-hour suborbital flights aboard an eight-seat spacecraft. It hopes to start offering the flights in 2009.
Customers have put down $21 million in deposits, Whitehorn says. Those who want to be among the first 100 to fly had to pay the full $200,000 fare up front; the rest put down a minimum deposit of $20,000.
 
What Airlines' New Spending Means For Fliers
After years of airline cutbacks, some fliers may have become resigned to dingy seats, costly snacks and surly service. But, now somewhat more flush with cash, reports The Wall Street Journal, carriers are planning a host of upgrades.
 
Cuba Offers Multi-Billion Dollar US Travel Market
Various US legislators are pushing for a return to normal relations with Cuba which could give a multi-billion dollar boost to tourism, according to TravelMole. If the US were to lift its travel restrictions to Cuba in 2008, nearly 1.8 million Americans would visit the country by 2010, estimates the American Society of Travel Agents. This could impact the US gross domestic product by as much as $1.6 billion, the society says.
Cuba's ailing dictator has been in failing health in recent years, spawning speculation of a return to normal relations with the US.
The US International Trade Commission (ITC) is currently investigating the effects on American producers of US travel and agricultural export restrictions with Cuba. Several bills have already been introduced in the House to ease the US embargo, which has been in place since 1962.
"No one is expecting a normalization of relations, at least while President Bush is in the White House, but the stage appears to be getting set for his successor," said wire services.
 
Hilton Hotels To Add "By Hilton" Branding To Lesser-Known Brand Names
Hilton Hotels Corporation is to add "by Hilton" branding to its Doubletree, Embassy Suites and Hampton hotels opening in Canada and Latin America in the future. The move also will retroactively affect many properties in those countries. The decision will not affect US hotels says EyeForTravel.
"While all three brands are well known within the United States, the Hilton name -- one of the most recognized in the hospitality industry worldwide -- is far better known in Canada and Latin America, representing a supreme opportunity for Doubletree, Embassy Suites and Hampton to be better recognized in those areas by virtue of their Hilton affiliation," said Ernie Wooden, Executive VP - Brand Management, Hilton Hotels Corporation.
"We have added 'by Hilton' to certain brands that are rapidly expanding into new markets abroad. This move comes on the heels of our recent merger with Hilton International and furthers our goal to become the premier global hotel franchise company," said Wooden.
The process will involve multiple steps. The most immediate and noticeable will involve changing the signage at most existing hotels, as well as selected graphics on collateral materials, in those countries. Secondary steps will occur at the sales and marketing level.
 
Company Aims To Capture Worldwide Market For Floating Hotels
Keppel Corp's offshore and marine unit – Keppel FELS – is keen to capture the worldwide market for floating hotels worth more than US$3 billion says Channel NewsAsia.
The Singapore company has just completed the sale of a high-tech version of the lodgings unit for US$305 million and said there is demand for more as investments pour into deepwater oil drilling. Nearly all of the 19 floating hotels worldwide are over 20 years old.
Keppel Offshore and Marine said with the rising demand for deepwater oil drilling and the need to replace ageing units, the market for these offshore lodgings could grow by at least 50% by 2011. Safety and technological advances will take center stage for these offshore living quarters, which can house up to 400 oil drilling construction and maintenance workers.
S. Jayakumar, General Manager, Marketing, Keppel FELS, said: "The key here is technology. The floating requirements have advanced a lot. Given that we're operating in deeper waters, in very stringent regulatory conditions, these units ought to have a lot more technological capability than before. We're looking at about 30 or so floatels in operation in the next five to six years. So that's 11 or 12 units in addition to what we have today."
Keppel FELS estimates that investments heading into deepwater oil drilling and production will amount to over US$50 billion in the next five years.
 
Air Canada A Blueprint For Airline Industry?
Selling bulk travel to individual customers is just one of a half-dozen innovations by Air Canada in recent years that have U.S. rivals glancing northward to monitor their acceptance by travelers. Once a lumbering money-loser, it's now a profitable pioneer, says USA Today, finding new ways to sell passengers only the services and amenities they want and nothing more.
With Air Canada, a traveler can, for example, cut fares by agreeing to leave a suitcase at home or by forgoing loyalty points. Or the traveler can choose to pay more for reserving a seat. In short, Canada's biggest and oldest carrier is showing its U.S. competitors a new way of doing business that could become the future of air travel.
Since the travel bust earlier this decade, Air Canada, the world's 13th-biggest airline, has broken from the pack of big airlines by focusing on customers rather than deep cost cuts, says Perry Flint, editor-in-chief of trade magazine Air Transport World.
"Very few airlines tackled the idea of trying to persuade customers that airlines deliver value for money," Flint says. Air Canada has achieved that largely by unbundling fares on its website so customers have no longer been forced to pay for things they haven't wanted, says Flint, whose publication awarded Air Canada its 2007 Airline Industry Achievement Award for Market Leadership.
Flint says major U.S. airlines, for now, are reluctant to adopt Air Canada's approach largely because of the financial risks if they prove to be a flop with their passengers. "The herd mentality means that no one wants to move first," Flint says.
Peter Belobaba, an airline pricing expert at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, agrees that Air Canada is ahead of the pack among North American airlines. "More than any other U.S. legacy carrier, they've been willing to try innovative ideas," he says.
 
Hotel Building Boom Driven By Shopping
Hundreds of new hotel rooms are coming to the inland portion of the Pensacola Bay Area of Florida. The growth spurt is prompted partly by a tourism trend that revolves around shopping says the Pensacola News Journal.
Sugar white beaches and year-round golfing are fine, but tourists increasingly look for malls and lifestyle centers when booking a hotel. "I can promise you this: The hotel industry knows better than anyone else that the No. 1 tourism activity anywhere in the country is shopping. It's No. 1 by a big margin," said Ed Schroeder, vice president of tourism development for the Pensacola Bay Area Chamber of Commerce.
Over the next couple years, at least eight hotels will be online in Florida’s Escambia and Santa Rosa counties ­ seven in Escambia and one in Santa Rosa. Besides tourists, targeted guests include business travelers. Three of the hotels are planned for development around University and Cordova malls.
Schroeder said activities such as going to the beach and golfing are far down on a typical tourist's list. "All across the country, malls are building themselves to be lifestyle centers," he said, referring to University Mall's plans for a makeover into an open-air lifestyle center. "Developers are developing around the shopping."
A few years ago, hotels such as the Hampton Inn and Fairfield Inn were built near the malls."Now, we're seeing a new wave of hotels," Schroeder said. "What's exciting is that these are strong three-star properties. They're national brands with much better services."
 
Study: Generating Word-Of-Mouth
Is the current definition of "influencer" too narrow asks eMarketer? Everyone has some influence, but people with larger networks use more technology to spread theirs, according to "Understanding Influence, and Making It Work For You: A CNET Networks Study."
Highly connected people use e-mail to keep up with their dozens of contacts. In fact, they use e-mail far more often than the phone to stay in touch.
The study also found that regardless of how connected they were, everyone was interested in about the same number of topics, and that influencers tend to pass along information they consider both unique and trusted. "Influencers" in this sense are people interested in a topic who are trying to spread the word, not just an elite set of people with charisma or sway.
The number of "influencers" who could contribute to a word-of-mouth campaign is therefore huge, since most of the population is at least moderately connected.
It all comes back to having something worth spreading the word about. Marketers surveyed by Osterman Research for BoldMouth, a Faber, Virginia.–based word-of-mouth marketing company, said that satisfied customers, along with great products or services, were the most important things needed to generate word-of-mouth.
 
Boston Hotel Tells Guests They Can Leave Their Laptops At Home
John Burke, vice president of technology at the Seaport Hotel in Boston, is betting that he is at the forefront of an emerging trend in hospitality services: giving guests a reason to leave their laptops at home.
Internet access now is as expected in hotel rooms as soap and shampoo. So to try to set itself apart from its rivals, says Computerworld, the Seaport has decided to up the ante and outfit rooms with thin-client systems that have full Internet access.
Burke said the hotel has installed thin clients made by Igel Technology Inc. in 85 of its 426 rooms, with plans calling for the devices to be added to the rest of the rooms over the next 12 months. The thin clients are integrated into 17-in. flat-panel monitors with touch-screen capabilities. There are no moving parts in the Web portals, which run an embedded version of Windows XP, support applications such as Adobe Acrobat and include a wireless keyboard.
Hotel officials see the thin-client system, which they’re calling the Seaportal, "as a way to leapfrog the competition" on guest services, Burke said. The Seaport also already offers Wi-Fi connectivity throughout its waterfront property on Boston Harbor.
 
Ryanair Willing To Sell Aer Lingus Slots
Ryanair has said it would be willing to sell Aer Lingus landing slots at London's Heathrow Airport in a bid to win European Commission approval for a takeover of the Irish flag carrier, says Airline Travel News.
The European Commission has until July 4 to decide on Ryanair's unsolicited offer, which originally valued Aer Lingus at 1.48 billion euros ($2 billion). The European Union competition regulator has rejected previous proposed solutions as insufficient to overcome competitive problems with the deal.

 
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