Online booking boom in Eastern Europe

According to the data, only 16% of hotels and other tourist accommodation facilities in Eastern Europe were purchased via the Internet. But it is expected that the share of online booking will increase to 23% by 2013.

Reservation market in Eastern Europe was estimated at 85 billion dollars in 2011. By 2013 it promises to grow up to 92.5 billion dollars, almost 21 billion of which will constitute online booking.

The main engine of online reservation growth will be Russia. Currently online booking is popular among the residents of large Russian cities. However, a substantial part of the tourists still use travel agencies for several reasons: low culture of computer knowledge, fear of fraudulent schemes and so on. Nevertheless, lower prices for online hotel reservation as well as resources with established reputation promise online booking tempting prospects.

According to PhoCusWright, entering of tourism to the online market will become more and more popular. Eastern Europe, mainly Russia, already now has dozens of projects that are implemented by both local and foreign investors. In 2012 two new hotel projects - oktogo.ru and ostrovok.ru - received about $20 million investment for further development.

In 2010 the number of network users, who prefer to book online accommodation for their holidays, was over 6 million people. At the same time tourist services via the Internet today are offered by only 5% of the total number of the Russian companies, while in the West the figure is 30-60%.