Airbnb is known for being a travel company, but now it’s going after a new target: the local businesses who can take advantage of the opportunities in their own backyard.
“Airbnb for work is more than business travel,” said David Holyoke, head of Airbnb for work.
He found out firsthand when he moved to San Francisco two years ago to work for the hospitality startup, currently valued at $31 billion. Holyoke wanted to get the kids settled into school and pick a neighborhood to live in, but hadn’t found a house available to rent at the time. He ended up staying in Airbnb rentals for nearly two months, realizing along the way that relocation benefits is another way businesses could be using Airbnb.
Up until now, Airbnb for work’s efforts have largely been focused on converting the business traveler to the platform. Already, there’s early signs of growth: More than 300,000 businesses have worked directly with Airbnb on their business travel needs, Holyoke said.
But the number of employees in a company that travel is typically small compared to its overall employee base. To continue to grow (and find demand in untapped markets), the company is now going after three different areas: team offsites or retreats, team-building experiences, and relocations. The push is in keeping with Airbnb’s strategy of expanding its definition of being just an alternative accommodations company into being a hospitality company that serves anyone’s needs, from travelers to teams alike.
Holyoke characterized the strategy shift as more of an “enhancement” than a deviation from its previous focus on wooing the corporate traveler. Many Airbnb users had been using the hospitality website already as an option during relocation. There’s also a category of home on Airbnb that is specifically “suitable for events,” although plenty of Airbnb customers have ignored that label before and tried to host everything from Bible studies to ragers in Airbnb homes.
Now, Airbnb will be making it easier to find those homes specifically designated for groups so it could be used as an offsite location without the need to hide that a large group is coming.
"When we talk about offsites, we’re showcasing unique homes where we believe teams can create and collaborate. These are homes where hosts have indicated their spaces are suitable for gatherings,” Holyoke said.
It will take a mindset shift though, from both hosts and businesses alike. Currently, most Airbnbs are set up for nightly rentals, much like a hotel. But a business’ needs are different. For offsites, many locations will need to be open during the day for companies to meet and retreat—not wait until a 3 p.m. check-in time. Holyoke said some hosts are already offering their spaces to be open during the day, but for now, the Airbnb booking process will remain the same.
For businesses, it will take a greater shift to think of Airbnb not just as a tool for travelers, but as a solution to corporate initiatives like team-building or employee relocation.
Team-building exercises often conjure images of trust falls or awkward ice breakers, but Airbnb wants businesses to consider their own brand of Experiences. For the last two years, Airbnb has been recruiting local hosts to create their own Experience, or host-led tour or activity. The company now has 15,000 across 800 cities, said Joe “Joebot” Zadeh, who runs Experiences. “We’ve seen a natural fit between experiences and the workplace for quite some time and maybe even before launch,” Zadeh told Forbes.
As Airbnb expands its relationship with businesses, Zadeh’s team has been looking at which Experiences are good for team-building as a group. Obvious ones include cooking classes or volunteer projects, but Airbnb’s platform can also push the boundaries of what’s normally considered a team-building treat. Zadeh’s favorite experience with his team was a jellyfish flash mob in San Francisco, where employees danced around with giant jellyfish puppets from Burning Man while someone carried a boom box.
“Most of our experiences don’t exist on other platforms. It’s people who have really cool passions,” Zadeh said.
It won’t be easy to convince corporate leaders that a jellyfish flash mob is as effective a team-builder as a ropes course or scavenger hunt, but Airbnb is betting that some companies will take the leap. Once that happens, Zadeh is excited about the future where people are introduced to Airbnb not only through traveling, but through their work—and in turn, book more experiences when they’re traveling on their own.
“We just think that enabling experiences not only when you’re traveling, but also for your own town—there’s no shortage of people who are looking to create stronger teams,” Zadeh said.
