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Survivor of 9/11 Economic Downturn HOTRES.com
Expands Hotel Reservation Services to 11 U.S. Cities Stamford, Conn.—June 4, 2003—In what company officials liken to the Phoenix rising from its ashes or perhaps the miracle of the 1969 Mets, HOTRES.com has survived the drastic falloff in domestic travel that followed the 9/11 disaster and is expanding its customer base by adding 10 cities and over 500 hotels to its online hotel reservation business. The company now offers hotel reservation services in Atlanta, Ga.; Boston, Mass.; Chicago, Ill.; Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco, Calif.; New Orleans, La., Miami and Orlando, Fla., and Washington, D.C. Additional hotels are being added to the original HOTRES.com roster in New York City. After the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center, HOTRES.com (http://www.hotres.com), a Stamford, Conn.-based Web site that provides travelers the means to research accommodations and make reservations at a wide variety of quality hotels, saw its hit count and revenues fall precipitously. At the time HOTRES.com (its name derives from “hotel reservations”) offered a choice of hotels in New York City only; and when business travel to the Big Apple fell by 22 percent the company reeled from the impact. The Internet boom had ended shortly before and by all accounts the company’s prospects were dim. “Immediately after the attack our bookings fell by about 65%,” said Zak Ayouby, general manager of HOTRES.com. “All we could do was hold on and weather the storm.” By the summer of last year New York hotel occupancy rates had rebounded to within a few percentage points of where they were before 9/11 and HOTRES.com began to recover. Despite another dip in business caused by the recent war in Iraq, HOTRES.com has regained its form. Making reservations at HOTRES.com is a simple process. Users choose a city and then select a hotel—or category of hotel—and enter their arrival date and length of stay. HOTRES.com responds immediately with availability and pricing, and offers a number of available alternatives. After a selection is made, HOTRES.com confirms all the details and requests a credit card for billing. The user can print a confirmation page with a hotel voucher to present at check in. A similar page is sent to the user’s e-mail address. Travel writers at The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and Fairfield County Business Journal have commented favorably on HOTRES.com’s user-friendly interface and many reviewers have deemed it one of the best Web sites for finding hotel bargains. Hotels offered are categorized as Moderate (two stars), First Class (three stars), Superior (four stars) and Deluxe (five stars). All offer single and double (one double or king size bed) accommodations, and many properties can also provide triples and quads for 3 or 4 guests. In many hotels children under 15 stay free if they share a room with parents. There are no minimums and with each reservation customers may book up to three rooms for up to 14 nights. Reservations are guaranteed until midnight on the night of arrival and are confirmed against a guaranteed block of rooms. As a result, during busy periods HOTRES.com users can often get a confirmed reservation when the hotel itself is advising travel agents and the public that it is sold out. “We believe that by applying the same combination of technology and personal service that was so successful in our New York operation, we can achieve the same level of success booking hotel reservations in the ten new HOTRES.com cities,” said Ayouby. HOTRES.com also now offers an opt-in email newsletter with hot tips on local restaurants, entertainment, attractions for children and the latest “insider” information about their new offering of destination cities.
For additional information please visit http://www.hotres.com.
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