The advent of the Internet and e-commerce as a delivery channel has dramatically affected the leisure travel industry, changing the roles of both the consumer and supplier. First, consumers have taken to online travel booking much more enthusiastically than any other type of online retail purchasing, driving the explosive speed at which change has occurred for this industry. To meet this demand, travel suppliers such as airlines, hotels, car rental agencies and travel agencies have rapidly shifted their web offerings from information-only sites to interactive sites, which offer online booking capability. According to Forrester Research, only 37% of travel sites allowed online booking in 1997, now many of the major airlines, hotels, and care rental agencies offer this capability. In the U.S., on-line leisure travel bookings were projected to range from 10 to 15 billion for the year 2000; over the next five years, Forrester expects this figure to double to 32.7 billion in 2005. The growth of the online travel booking is expected to grow 14% over the next five years.
Travelocity who is pioneered the online travel agency and continues to be the most popular travel service on the Web, giving consumers access to hundreds of airlines, thousands of hotels and cruise, last-minute and vacations packages, and best-in-class car rental companies. With 40 million members, Travelocity is the seventh largest travel agency in the United States. It has been recognized worldwide for its leadership in the online travel space, and it operates or powers Web sites in five languages across four continents. .
Based on Travelocity, I would like examine how the development and use of e-commerce has affected the tourism industry. Additionally, I will take Travelocity for example, discussing its successful factors and existing issues in this essay. .
The affect of e-commerce on Tourism industry.
What is online tourism? Online tourism is a concept of embracing e-commerce and online technologies with the tourism industry.