by Toby Smith 05/12/08
The travel industry is already starting to feel the impact of a consumer spending downturn, and the "middleman" sites -- a la Orbitz (OWW), Travelocity, Hotels.com and Expedia (EXPE) -- are getting cut out of consumers' budgets as well.
However, online travel booking is far from dead. A new ChangeWave Alliance survey of online travel Web sites shows consumers are increasingly turning to the sites of individual airlines and hotels instead.
The recent survey indicates that, since our last survey in February, the usage of hotel chain Web sites rose 14 points (29%) and airline sites is up 7 points (41).
These trends should continue gaining momentum in the next 90 days -- led by a 56% jump in the number of consumers who say they'll use the Webs ites of individual hotel chains to make their reservations, and an even-bigger 145% jump in the percentage who will use individual airline sites.
Looks like that traveling gnome from the Travelocity ads may be spending more time on the lawn this summer. ...
