Germany: Travel metasearch engine Trivago has informed its shareholders that it will need to prepare for “significant” restructuring in terms of job cuts and its “organisational setup”.
The website, which aggregates vacation rental as well as hotel bookings, has seen its referral revenue drop by more than 95 per cent in the last week of the first quarter of 2020, which Trivago earns by charging advertisers for sending it leads on accommodation bookings.
Having generated 74 per cent of its revenue from Booking Holding and parent company Expedia Group, the company has seen its income from advertising largely wiped out as the major players with the travel industry cut down on marketing expenditure.
According to Skift, employees in Trivago’s marketing, sales and HR teams based at its Germany headquarters were told their working hours would be reduced and the German government is currently subsidising a portion of its payroll before a round of redundancies takes place.
Trivago joins a lengthening line of global travel companies to announce furloughs or impending pay or job cuts, following in the footsteps of the likes of Airbnb, OYO, Booking Holdings, Expedia and TripAdvisor, as the coronavirus continues to decimate the travel sector as we know it.
The Dusseldorf-based company was established as the first hotel search engine in Germany and achieved rapid growth, seeing profitability double from 2008 to 2012, when Expedia Group acquired a stake in it for $632 million.
CEO Axel Hether, who replaced former Rolf Schrรถmgens in the role in November, has since announced that Trivagoย will be reporting its first quarter results by 5 June.
