As business travel declines, Airbnb sees opportunity in remote work travel

While business travel has been one of the victims of the coronavirus pandemic, Airbnb plans to capitalize on the new work-life balance that has emerged during the shift to remote working.

Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky told CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Thursday that the house rental company was seeing signs that consumers were taking advantage of the anywhere work model that businesses adopt to get out of their homes. them and change of scenery.

“The lines between travel and living are starting to blur,” he said in an interview with “Mad Money”.

Instead of just renting Airbnb sites for vacations, more and more people are using rental for living purposes, said Chesky, who bought out the company he founded last year. The IPO, initially slated for early 2020, was postponed later in the year due to uncertainty surrounding the global pandemic. The travel industry has been one of the parts of the economy hardest hit due to lockdowns that have been put in place around the world to contain Covid-19.

Now remote workers have even more flexibility, choosing to take more three-day weekends or relocate longer than before, as long as the internet is available to connect to Zoom for business purposes, Chesky said. .

“We think a lot of travel will be in small towns because people are going to get in cars and travel nearby,” he said.

“We are really adaptable and resistant to any type of travel behavior. That’s what we learned last year,” he added.

The comments come after Airbnb released its first quarterly report as a state-owned company. It missed analysts’ expectations on the bottom line, although it exceeded estimates on the top line.

Airbnb said it achieved fourth quarter revenue of $ 859 million, compared to FactSet’s estimate of $ 747 million and a net loss of $ 3.89 billion. Much of the loss was attributed to fees billed to it at the end of last year.

Airbnb shares fell sharply on Thursday, closing 9% at $ 182.06, alongside other tech and high-growth stocks on a brutal day on Wall Street.

Since the start of the year, the stock is up 24%.