Is Travel a Right or a Privilege Post-Covid? The Skift Team Discusses

Bing Hui Yau  / Unsplash

Travel aspirations are fueling a lot of important conversations about travels recovery. Bing Hui Yau / Unsplash

Skift Take: Our collective aspirations to travel are fueling a lot of important conversations about a recovery, and what travel should be about on the other side. Read the Skift team’s back-and-forth on these topics around our virtual water cooler from Wednesday afternoon.

— Tom Lowry

Read the Complete Story On Skift

Japan Weighs Ban on Overseas Spectators for Tokyo Olympics

Reuters

The Tokyo Olympic Games are scheduled to begin in late July. The organizing committee is considering barring international spectators from attending the games due to the pandemic. Reuters

Skift Take: The Olympics games are set to begin in less than five months, but the spread of new coronavirus variants worldwide is worrying organizers. A ban would disappoint hundreds of thousands of expected spectators, but might be a good public health decision.

— Sean O’Neill

Read the Complete Story On Skift

U.S. Hotel Jobs Recovery Stalls, Unemployment Rises

Elizabeth Backus  / Flickr

The U.S. hotel unemployment rate jumped more than 4 percent in January due to a longer-than-expected travel recovery. Elizabeth Backus / Flickr

Skift Take: The slow winter travel season, delayed vaccination schedules, and people giving up on hotel jobs are pushing the hospitality sector unemployment figures up once again. More vaccines can speed up the recovery (the industry hopes).

— Cameron Sperance

Read the Complete Story On Skift

Loyalty Goes Both Ways in a Pandemic When Airlines Exit Markets

Skift

After announcing its exit from long-haul flights due to the pandemic, Norwegian Air on Monday issued a pause to its frequent flyer loyalty reward program affecting millions of passengers worldwide. Skift

Skift Take: Many global airlines have reduced long-haul flights or exited markets altogether due to the pandemic, but more often than not their loyalty points have an expiration date. Now is a really good time for airlines to put customers first and adjust their valuable currency — or risk losing their loyalty.

— Ruthy Muñoz

Read the Complete Story On Skift

Hotels Hope Profits Are Cooking in the Ghost Kitchen Business

Graduate Hotels

The Graduate Berkeley (pictured) is the first to host a multi-branded ghost kitchen in a partnership between parent company Graduate Hotels and C3. Graduate Hotels

Skift Take: The pandemic has produced unlikely partnerships between the hotel and office sectors, but the longevity is up for debate. The ghost kitchen pairing between hotels and an outside food operator may actually stick for years to come, as it solves a pre-pandemic revenue loss problem.

— Cameron Sperance

Read the Complete Story On Skift