Crisis means extra custom for private landlords
Private accommodation agencies offer services to hotel and restaurant association: not a good development
STUTTGART (wb). For many big hotels, private landlords are insignificant rivals who operate on the periphery of the trade and have a very different clientele to their own. But for their smaller establishments, they represent tough competition which could intensify in the wake of increasingly professional marketing strategies by these private suppliers. "Night&Day", for example, has recently launched a widespread advertising campaign in Stuttgart's city centre for its private accommodation service. The Association is sceptical about the development.
"We are a bed and breakfast agency, like the kind you find abroad, especially in Great Britain. But we've been on the market in the Stuttgart area since 1996", comments managing director Markus Urban. He offers 750 properties — rooms, apartments, holiday flats and houses, some of them presented with pictures in the Internet (www.night-and-day.de). "Night&Day" takes around 500 bookings a month. For the guest, the service is free of charge.
Given the relatively long tenancies ("usually a week or more, and longer for flats") Markus Urban believes the private accommodation agency concept differs fundamentally to that of hotels. For example, because of the effort involved in taking bookings and handing over keys, guests requiring accommodation for just one night are better catered for in hotels. He is also confident because around 10 percent of his portfolio is made up of hotels and guesthouses on the outskirts of Stuttgart, and he knows they are grateful when his agency helps find guests for these less attractive rooms. Urban conciliates: "We don't see ourselves as competition but as a valuable addition to the traditional hotel trade." He views "Night&Day" as an attractive proposition for money-conscious customers (according to advertisements, a room with breakfast is available from 15 Euro) and an interesting alternative for guests looking for a temporary "home from home".
Volker Braun, managing director of DEHOGA Baden-Württemberg, takes a less favourable view of the agency's relationship to competitors (in Ludwigsburg there is also an offshoot of the nationally represented supplier "bed & breakfast") and fears loss of custom for small and medium-sized hotels. "Not a good development": this is how Braun describes the trade's perspective. "It becomes particularly apparent here." The relationship to the economic situation is easy to see, which is why Braun shows a certain sympathy for the point of view of guests "who have less and less money and are therefore prepared to accept lower-category accommodation". Petra Thollembeek, manager of the Tourism and Hotel Trade group points out parallels to low-budget chains and the special advantage of private rooms: landlords with fewer than 8 beds do not require a special concession according to the Statute Governing Restaurants and therefore have to fulfil fewer conditions and regulations than a hotel.
DEHOGA Niedersachsen is following its own line with holiday accommodation operators, and it set up a special work group on the subject in the mid-90s. According to Rainer Balke, head of the regional association, this was prompted by the special situation of coastal and island resorts where – as is the case in Schleswig-Holstein – many hotel owners started offering holiday flats as a sideline. On the island of Norderney, they represented up to 50 percent of members together with suppliers of holiday flats only.
"But in general, this initiative has never been a great success", says Balke. And the response has never been particularly lively in other regional associations. But DEHOGA Niedersachsen continues to try and recruit holiday home owners as members. Balke: "We remain open-minded."