Greening Up the Online Travel Industry

The environment is slowly becoming more and more important to travellers. A few decades ago, no one had even heard of the phrase “carbon neutral”; now, people are planning out their holidays by evaluating each company’s green credentials, according to this article by Forrester after their report “Green Online Travellers: Assessing the Brand Impact of Travellers’ Environmental Concerns” was completed. The impact on the industry is still small: although 42% of travellers booking their services online said they were concerned about the environment, only 7% actively made decisions with the environment in mind.

However, companies are beginning to see an opportunity in this new market niche, and two have recently cropped up which have the potential to make a huge splash in the travel market. They remind us that there is room for sustainable innovation in every sector of every industry.

Car rental company Vroom VroomVroom facilitate car rentals through major companies, and buys carbon offsets for each rental. It’s a great way to set a conscious traveller’s mind at ease while they get around the best way that they can during their holiday. They don’t need to set up their own fleet of cars, because they go through existing rental companies. What’s more, they manage to offer very competitive rates – a good strategy for any company, but particularly for a business with the environment as its major draw. Offering low rates appeals to a much broader section of the market, and combined with the environmental conscience, it makes an irresistible draw-card. The only drawback  is that, since they are fairly new, Vroom VroomVroom’s carbon offset information still needs work to be credible and air-tight.

Meanwhile, hotel booking website Whole Travel ranks hotels based on their sustainability as well as their overall quality as accommodation. It’s not just the green angle they’re going for; the properties are rated on their environmentally friendly practices, economic management, support for local society and culture, and their interactions with customers. Users can search by destination or accommodation type.

They set the rankings themselves, which does carry a question of credibility with it – but word is they are planning to involve local organisations to help them verify their claims. They have a large list of properties, which is key: all the goodwill in the world won’t make a booking website successful if it doesn’t have a decent variety of options. Today’s consumers are all about choice, and if they can’t find exactly what they want, they know there’s another website just a few clicks away.

While not every traveller considers the environment to be a major factor in their holiday decision-making process, ventures like these are the key to making the industry more conscious as a whole. They make it cheap and easy to have a conscience: the Holy Grail of sustainability.