Airbnb announces partnership with GSB in Thailand
Thailand: Airbnb has announced a partnership with the Government Savings Bank (GSB), Thailand’s state-owned bank, to help promote hospitality entrepreneurs across the local home-stay industry.
Via a press release, the two companies said the partnership would allow GSB to provide better funding for emerging Thai hospitality entrepreneurs by offering options such as flexible-interest rate loans and instalment plans.
Airbnb will collaborate with the bank to build capacity through hospitality and training hosts while connecting property owners to its global platform and marketplace community.
GSB president and CEO, Dr. Chatchai Payuhanaveechai, and Airbnb general manager for Southeast Asia, Hong Kong and Taiwan, Mike Orgill, jointly announced the partnership.
As part of a launch pilot, the two companies trained GSB officials and 29 local home-stay groups, involved in GSB’s ‘Smart Home-stay 2018 Competition’, which recognised outstanding home-stays in different regions across Thailand.
Airbnb is envisaging that the partnership will support local sustainable tourism while spreading income distribution more equally across communities in Thailand. That aligns with the Thai government’s own initiative to fuel local economic growth through a tourism drive.
Both GSB and Airbnb are committing to widen the business opportunities available for Thai hospitality micro-entrepreneurs, which will have a knock-on effect by generating income for local communities in some of Thailand’s secondary cities.
GSB is now set to provide a tailored loan package consisting of smaller, flexible loans to hospitality micro-entrepreneurs. Meanwhile, Airbnb will lead a series of capacity building sessions to help GSB officials utilise its platform efficiently and allow them to relay the information to other home-stay owners.
To coincide with the launch, home-stay owners participated in a number of sessions, including an Airbnb host onboarding and activation workshop, designed to teach them about tourism and its opportunities, as well as an Airbnb host onboarding and activation workshop.
One Airbnb superhost and English teacher, Nitaya Laisuwan, who hosts for guests in her Bangkok property, also shared her own story and best home-sharing practices with the audience.
