Anyone else not really feeling “Categories?”

[Richard531]

I've always felt that Brian Chesky was a little out of touch.  But I gotta say: I’m starting to feel that way more now than ever. It’s the same self-righteous attitude on his latest video, but his time he went a little too far and is taking the direction of the company with him.    

That is, the continued pounding of the war drum: "People can work from wherever they want now."  And it’s been discussed 100 times, but let’s remind everyone that this line of thinking forgets ~80% of the workforce/would-be travelers! 

Teachers, plumbers, garbage men, electricians, doctors, gardeners, therapists, restaurant workers, retail workers, delivery drivers, general contractors, mothers/fathers, THE STAFF WE DEPEND ON, like house cleaners, handymen, and our very selves as property managers and project directors of new listings.  None of them/us can, "Work from wherever they (we) want."  And never will we be able to work from wherever we want.  So the whole entry point is flawed from the start.  I get it, a billionaire CEO can load up his pooch and get on a ferry to an awesome 3 BR/ 2 Bath listing.  He can hole up there for a week and “work” while he does a couple virtual yoga class, gets food delivered, and has a masseuse to come to the home.  But everyone else? Not so much. 

It makes me cringe when he deduces that just because a portion of a portion of the workforce can kinda/sorta work from home now on a more consistent basis that the entire market would say out loud "Hummm, where should I go?" when contemplating travel plans.  That’s just not how it goes in the real world.

99% of us have a TIME in which to vacation and a DESTINATION in mind that we'd like to go to.  THEN, we book flights, and THEN we find our accommodations based on those parameters.    

The more conspicuous problem for "Categories" and thinking that, "People can work from wherever they want," is that the WFH mantra is slowly eroding as Covid-19 gets deeper and deeper into the rearview (THANK GOD).  It's all going to get back to normal.  And sooner than we think. 

Meanwhile, we’ll be stuck with these "Categories" as our guests are being peddled treehouses in Brazil and castles in Ireland when all they really want is a decent/cost effective beach condo in Miami or a house to enjoy with their family in the California Hi-Desert. 

I'm not one to just resist change!  But I think Airbnb really missed the ball on this.  

[Jenny]

Hi @Kitty-and-Creek0 

I'm so sorry that you're experiencing issues which others have also reported.

I just wanted to make sure you knew that I'd seen your posts and that your feedback has been noted to pass back to the product team and any other relevant Airbnb people.

If anything changes or there's anything else happening, please post here and tag me, I'm updating as much as I can at the moment.

Jenny

[Kristina46]

I'm in Hawaii, on the Big Island, and searching in "Beaches" yielded properties on another ISLAND. Yup, I got shown places in Lahaina. Nice. Now Maui is nearby, in relative terms. It's only 20 minutes .....but BY AIR. 

[Richard531]

@Anonymous  once again took what I was trying to say and refined it/improved it even more so.  

"The update already feels a bit outdated. Whatever reasons a traveler might have to plan a trip to Hollywood, none of them will be satisfied by the algorithm showing them a yurt in Fresno or some stupid treehouse. Most of the stuff that turns up on the screen amounts to pretty clutter."  Exactamundo.  These listings are great for your IG fantasy, but are they really places people want to temporarily reside and "live like a local?"  Or do travelers ultimately find themselves in these structures and wish they were actually in a proper home?  The anecdotal (and extremely non-scientific) consensus that I seem to see on these structures is that they are in the 4.75 star range.  And 4.75 kinda means that the listing leaves a lot of people disappointed.  These kinds of spaces may actually turn people OFF from the platform which, in the long term, can hurt all of us.  These kinds of places should be pushed on platforms like Hipcamp (or similar). 

And don't get me wrong: I wouldn't mind a $15K yurt in Fresno or a treehouse doing $100K a year!  But I don't and I won't.  I follow the County codes, permit all our work, and now I'm holding extremely expensive assets that are safe for guests, licensed, built to last, and actually add to the neighborhoods that we're blessed to operate.  And I'd like my platform to reward me for that!  It sucks to feel like we're having our lunch stolen by unpermitted/illegal temp structures which not only have low investment metrics but also (more recently) seem to have the algorithm on their side.  Argh!  

"When you're letting short-term, the guests you want are the ones who are mostly there for the destination, doing fun things outside of the house during the day, and making light use of the home."  Again, nailed it.  That's not to say that making your home a decent destination in and of itself isn't a good thing.  It is!  But that's not a recipe for long term success - at all.  I'm gleefully feeling the transition from families pounding our properties day/night and instead finally going to the local attractions.  The properties can breathe (a little) and our crews are far happier.  I'd like to have our properties be more positioned more in that vein as well.  

[Kitty-and-Creek0]

@Richard531

Thank you for stating: 

"I follow the County codes, permit all our work, and now I'm holding extremely expensive assets that are safe for guests, licensed, built to last, and actually add to the neighborhoods that we're blessed to operate.  And I'd like my platform to reward me for that!"

Also  on my list is permitted and legal with the local government, collecting TOT, etc. It is the other half of the equation, that is being a good, contributing citizen. 

[Debra300]

@Richard531, @Anonymous,

Airbnb is doubling down on their thinking that a key segment of their customer base are digital nomads.  They have partnered with the Caribbean Tourism Organization to launch the promote their work and live anywhere program:  

https://news.airbnb.com/the-caribbean-joins-the-live-and-work-anywhere-initiative-to-welcome-digital-nomads-to-the-region/#:~:text=to%20the%20region-,The%20Caribbean%20joins%20the%20Live%20and%20Work%20Anywhere%20initiative,digital%20nomads%20to%20the%20region&text=Airbnb%20and%20the%20Caribbean%20Tourism,Work%20from%20the%20Caribbean%22%20campaign.

Besides the keen observations that you've both mentioned, the timing of this launch is really out of touch with current events.  The impact of supply chain issues amplified by the pandemic and the unfortunate war on Ukraine has been more significant on small developing countries than those which are more self-sustainable.  Since March, in St. Lucia the cost of electricity has risen 20%, gasoline and diesel increased 14%, LP gas has gone up by over 20%.  Since the majority of consumable items are imported, food and grocery prices are becoming unaffordable for many people.  Similar cost increases have occurred throughout the region, and inflationary changes are expected to continue through the next few fiscal quarters.  Even folks who live in the largest cities may be unprepared for the day-to-day costs of island life.  It may be acceptable during a vacation holiday to pay $15 USD p/kg for broccoli, $10 USD for a box of cold cereal and $5 USD for a quart of dairy milk, but many travelers cannot afford those costs for the long-term and still maintain their primary homes.  

Although the work and live anywhere program isn't likely to increase long-term stays in the Caribbean, the regional economy is so fragile right now that they will latch onto just about any program in hopes that it will provide even the slightest bit of revenue.

I am fortunate, and have been working remotely for 10 years, but even my company is trying to get its employees who live within 50 miles of an office to go in at least two days per week.  Which I will do when I am at my US home.  Although those days will be less productive than my WFH days, because I will be going to lunch and taking breaks to socialize, which doesn't happen at home.  I read an interesting Forbes articles about why management is resistant to  remote work: 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jackkelly/2021/08/17/the-real-reasons-why-companies-dont-want-you-to-work-remotely/?sh=370dbd6b7fb3

My bookings via Airbnb have been barely palpable during the past 10 months, but have risen greatly on other platforms, and a few have been for more than one rental in the same reservation.  I believe that Airbnb missed an opportunity to increase bookings with its latest overhaul when it didn't include listing co-located spaces on the same page.  Frequently, there are groups traveling together, especially for an event, that want to be at the same rental location, but not share rental space with each other.  There have been a few times after a guest arrives and sees that we have more suites, they comment, "Oh, I wish I had known that you had other suites, because my friend/co-worker/family member is staying at XX, and we would have preferred to be stay close to each other.

[Mark116]

@Debra300  I'd guess that 'digital nomads' would be a smaller but highly profitable segment of their base, but as @Anonymous  outlined, most people, even if they work from home, are not going to be able to work from anywhere, not even anywhere in their own country because of mortgages/rents/children and other commitments based on location.  It's fine to cater to digital nomads, but turning the entire system on its end, for a niche market, seems crazy.

If this were a different company with a better track record, I might believe that their data shows them that WFH really will become the norm over the next 10 years.  However, its Airbnb with a long and inglorious record of its aspirations not matching the travel reality on the ground, so I suspect this more of the same. It's what the people at Airbnb see and talk about with their peers, others in the tech industry, and they wrongly thing it relates to a wider swath of their consumer base than it really does or ever will.

[Debra300]

@Mark116,

I hope my comments didn't imply that I thought that Airbnb was going in the right direction, or that their venture was timely.  I was trying to point out that even long-term digital nomads are being called back into the office, and the market of folks who have that type of flexibility is dwindling.  Plus, even those who are able to work anywhere may not be able to afford living at their chosen "anywherever".

I am for the Bay Area, and have been working in tech for a long time.  San Francisco has one of the lowest child per household ratio in the US, because it's so costly to live there.  However, due to the typical salary of seasoned technology professional, they are surrounded by folks who probably have more discretionary income than a family with children, and forget that not everyone can live the same way as they do.  As @Richard531, the folks at Airbnb are living in a microscopic bubble, and it's been burst by the "back to normalcy" pin.

[Anonymous]

@Debra300   Only time will tell, but my hunch is that Airbnb's forecast of "live and work anywhere" becoming a "permanent part of company culture" will turn out to be pure over-extrapolation:

I'm also finding that most employers who support WFH are not on board with their staff working too remotely or trying to have exotic vacations while on the clock. And just about everyone I know who experimented with the "work anywhere" lifestyle to cope with the last couple years of isolation is already over it. I'm sure there's a niche for digital nomads, but I doubt that Airbnb's initiatives will expand that niche beyond its natural size. 

[Debra300]

The recent rollout brings to mind a May 2020 Skift article about the now defunct Airbnb Plus program.  It appears that the Airbnb product development team didn't do a thorough post-mortem of the Plus program, and note or apply any lessons learned to this latest deployment.  For historical perspective, the Plus program was launched in February 2018, and by April 2020 it was no longer supported.  The pandemic only hastened the demise of the faulty program.

"Vision Versus Reality

The vision of Airbnb Plus was to establish hotel-like standards for homes that were inspected annually for 100 checklist items, and exhibited quality design and amenities from kitchens stacked with coffee to easy check-in and fast Wi-Fi.

But sources said Airbnb Plus stumbled in part because Airbnb co-founder and CEO Brian Chesky, who’s been a design guru since his years as a student at the Rhode Island School of Design, emphasized design over the basics, and the program wasn’t scalable, and was poorly implemented. Airbnb declined to comment on that premise."

“The instinct to create a standard of excellence that guests can trust when they book through Airbnb was sound, but the devil is in the details, and the execution was not up to par,” said Dan Driscoll, co-founder and chief operating officer of luxury vacation rental business Boutiq."

"“From the perspective of many Airbnb Plus homeowners, it did not appear that the program was being run by people who were themselves Airbnb Plus listing owners, and thus these Airbnb Plus team members didn’t fully understand their product and their users,” Driscoll said."

"One Airbnb Plus contractor, who declined to be identified, talked about a few problems with the growth strategy and culture.

“What didn’t make sense to me was to plan for Plus to blitz-scale,” the contractor said. “Not every business should scale. Plus should have grown organically, by recognizing super-hosts who were ready to go live because of their design standards. They were allowing any host to be on Plus, even hosts new to the platform, but then expected them to have high levels of hosting.”

https://skift.com/2020/05/29/airbnb-plus-is-all-but-abandoned-as-a-grand-dream-that-never-met-expect...

@Anonymous, @Richard531, @Mark116, @Branka-and-Silvia0, @Kitty-and-Creek0, @Ann72, @Emilia42

[Mark116]

@Debra300  Yep.  Another inexplicable fault with Airbnb is that they seem to never learn from past mistakes.  Plus. Luxe. Now this mess.

[Ann72]

@Debra300  Good comparison.  What were they thinking when they claimed the listings would be "inspected annually for 100 checklist items"?  I like the contractor's quote that "not every business should scale.  Plus should have grown organically."  

[Richard531]

@Kitty-and-Creek0 

Yep!  2 of the 3 Counties we serve automatically collect local taxes (we still have to send in quarterly reports that outline total revenue/occupancy/cleaning fees, etc.).  The 3rd County, we have a separate TOT permit and (of course) collect and remit local taxes on a quarterly basis as well.  

It's a substantial amount of money. 

In addition to being the right thing to do, this money helps sustain the STR economy with regard to would be regulation, etc.  Afterall. . .  Money, is the final conversation point, on all subjects, in all areas, in everything.  

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

I doubt these categories are made for digital nomads in mind. Here in Croatia, they book an Airbnb for two weeks and then search for more affordable accommodation on local platforms and Facebook.

They are interested in apartments up to a max 700€ per month all included ( in other words long-term prices) but they want much more than long-term tenants (dishes, sheets, wifi, iron blah blah...) and more than tourists (working desk, working chair, fast wifi, enough storage space, full kitchen...)

They are also more indoors than tourists or students. To make it even worse - they are interested in touristic destinations during the top season but, at long-term/off-season prices.

No wonder local hosts are not very interested to take them and some who did - had bad experiences with them (left the place dirty and full of mold)

I think it is a great idea to offer different kinds of spaces for those who want something unusual.

What I don't like is this mess with dates and location.

[Ted307]

@Branka-and-Silvia0 @Anonymous 

I read this interview with Brian Cheskey in the Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/05/18/airbnb-remote-work/

It seems that Air is going all in on the "digital nomad" thing. Sounds like long term renting to programmers with a frat boy mentality is the new wave of the future! It might be better to not be found in a search by such tenants.

Chris

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

@Ted307  Airbnb wants to attract DNs and that is understandable but Airbnb is too expensive for most of them and it is too risky for hosts because there is no security deposits. what i wanted to say is - i doubt Airbnb created categories for DNs. Not many of them will stay for a couple of months in the castle or tree house 🙂