Qunar CEO Gang Chen: Price sensitivity is not poor, we must be cheaper than others

The Paper's reporter Tang Yingying

On September 27, Qunar disclosed data showing that in the first half of 2021, Qunar's transportation and accommodation bookings reached double-digit growth compared with the same period before the epidemic in 2019, with high-star hotels increasing by more than 30% and more than 7 million users buying their first ticket through Qunar.

Although the impact of the epidemic has not completely subsided, Qunar CEO Chen Gang expressed firm confidence at Qunar's 2021 mid-year internal strategic communication meeting: "The epidemic does not change the long-term fundamentals of the tourism industry, and in the next five years, China's tourism industry will continue to maintain a high-speed growth of more than double digits." ”

At Qunar's internal strategic communication meeting, Chen Gang expressed optimism about future data: "In the next five years, China's tourism industry will continue to maintain double-digit growth every year. ”

Chen Gang analyzed that the average GDP of Chinese is just over 10,000 US dollars, from the growth curve of developed countries, in the next 10 to 20 years, tourism expenditure will become a very large piece of Chinese households irreplaceable consumption, and will continue to grow. At the same time, China is the world's largest mobility market.

Chen Gang believes that there are still 333 prefecture-level cities in China, which directly determines that in the next 5 years, the growth rate of domestic large transportation business will remain above 10%; correspondingly, the growth rate of large accommodation will reach 20%.

Chen Gang pointed out that Qunar's growth momentum in the past two years has come from the "sinking market". According to the data disclosed by Qunar, even if affected by the epidemic, more than 9 million users on Qunar's platform still purchased their first ticket in 2020; in the first half of 2021, more than 7 million new ticket users have been used. The data shows that more than 40% of these users are from third-tier cities and below.

It is understood that Chen Gang also issued a strategic deployment internally, requiring the resolute implementation of the new low-price strategy of "low price + quality". Chen Gang emphasized: "Low prices are Qunar's famous works. The value of our existence is to help users save money. ”

"Price sensitivity is not poverty, but unwillingness to pay IQ tax." Chen Gang pointed out that in the next step, Qunar should use the method of digging up low air tickets to make hotels. "What we have to do is not to be more expensive than others, but to be cheaper than others."

Previously, on August 10, Qunar announced through an internal letter that it would adjust the structure of domestic hotels in the air ticket destination business group and set up four departments: product platform, supply platform, low-star hotel and high-star hotel.

"The domestic OTA platform has been developed for more than ten years, and the value created for customers has become very clear, one is the connection, the other is the transaction." Chen Gang said that the epidemic is actually forcing OTAs to further realize their own values, "Where to go in the culture is not lying flat, will not lie flat." In the future, we have the courage and confidence to impact the first place in the subdivision area and market segment. ”

Editor-in-Charge: Liu Xiuhao

Proofreader: Yijia Xu