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1. Accor To Sell Stake in Lifestyle Division Ennismore
Accor announced plans to sell 10.8% of it's lifestyle division Ennismore to a group of investors backed by Qatar First Bank for roughly 200 million euros ($211 million), valuing the company's lifestyle brands at over 2 billion euros, HNN's Terence Baker reports.
Jean-Jacques Morin, Accor’s chief financial officer and deputy CEO, said the deal is a sign of strength for the company's overall asset-light business model.
“There has been a lot of interest in Ennismore as a business, but perhaps there has not been an understanding of what it is in its details. This transaction sends a very strong message of its asset value. It helps in terms of strategy to further simplify its platforms, which now include all-inclusive and Paris Society, much more of a concentrated platform,” he said.
2. AAA Predicts Nearly 50 Million Travelers for July Fourth
AAA's latest projections for Independence Day-related travel estimate 47.9 million people will travel 50 miles or more from their homes for the holiday weekend, spanning from June 30 to July 4. That number represents a 3.7% increase over 2021 and nearly matches 2019 volumes.
The association is projecting record-breaking car travel with 42 million people expected to hit the roads despite national gas prices exceeding $5 a gallon.
Air travel is expected to grow marginally over 2020, with 3.55 million travelers compared to 3.5 million the year prior.
3. Hotel Execs Navigate Sea of Choices for Tech Investment
The hotel industry often gets dinged for being laggards in technology adoption, but brand executives speaking at the NYU International Hospitality Industry Investment Conference said they have to be thoughtful in terms of what technologies to invest in and to commit owners' money to, HNN's Bryan Wroten reports.
“It’s not an infinite set of choices that meet that intersection,” said Elie Maalouf, CEO of the Americas at IHG Hotels & Resorts. “There are a lot of great ideas that appear every day, people trying to sell you things, but it’s our duty as leaders to really differentiate between the things that make a difference to our guests and provide a return to owners and the things that are just kind of nice to have but are going to go away.”
4. War Keeps Travelers Away from Adriatic Coast
One of the many symptoms of Russia's war in Ukraine has been the disappearance of travelers to resorts along the Adriatic coast in Croatia, Montenegro and Albania, which are popular destinations for travelers from both Ukraine and Russia, Reuters reports.
This is likely to have major financial impacts in these regions, according to Reuters. Tourism makes up roughly 20% of Montenegro's economy.
5. Yellowstone Set To Reopen After Damaging Flood
Visitors are expected to be allowed back into Yellowstone National Park today even as the park has been ravaged by record flooding, the Associated Press reports.
"Park managers are raising the gates at 8 a.m. Wednesday at three of Yellowstone’s five entrances for the first time since June 13, when 10,000 visitors were ordered out after rivers across northern Wyoming and southern Montana surged over their banks following a torrent of rainfall that accelerated the spring snowmelt," the news agency reports.
Access will resume to attractions such as Old Faithful, but the northern area of the park — where most travelers are able to see wildlife like bears, wolves and bison — will remain closed, though.