Hotel distribution research: Direct bookings in the Swiss hotel industry on the up for the pandemic year 2020

In order to obtain a representative overview of the current sales situation in the hotel industry on a broader level in Switzerland, HotellerieSuisse conducted a joint survey with the Institute of Tourism of the University of Applied Sciences and Arts Western Switzerland (HES-SO Valais-Wallis) in Sierre between January and February 2021 for the 17th time since 2003. The results should paint as accurate a picture as possible of the current state of sales (online and offline) in the Swiss hotel industry, especially with regard to the role of online booking portals (OTAs).

An executive summary of the research in English is available here below.

Key trends:

• Direct booking channels continue to be the most important sales channels for the Swiss hotel industry, accounting for 62.5% of overnight stays, and even increased by around 5% in 2020 compared to 2019;
• Bookings via traditional tourism partners now only account for a small amount (8.8%) and have been in gradual decline for the past 16 years;
• Online sales decreased slightly: overall, 36% of overnight stays were still generated in real time via online channels;
• Booking Holdings gains market share in Switzerland in spite of the pandemic, but Expedia and HRS lose out.

The data collection in Switzerland for the reference year 2020 was carried out by means of an online questionnaire. The results here are based on responses from 332 establishments in Switzerland, which corresponds to a response rate of 8%. 4,160 hotels in the Swiss hotel database were contacted by e-mail.