global financial crisis tourism

The Caribbean tourism sector entered 2010 still recovering from the sharpest contraction of leisure travel spending since the 1991 Gulf War. The Haiti earthquake of January 2010 added a humanitarian dimension to Caribbean news cycles, generating mixed effects on the region’s tourism promotion environment. Airbnb was entering only its second full year of operation, and the Caribbean remained almost entirely dependent on VRBO and HomeAway for online vacation rental distribution.

The second half of 2009 found the Caribbean tourism sector at the nadir of the global financial crisis recession, with leisure travel spending depressed across all source markets and Jamaica’s stopover arrivals running significantly below 2007–2008 peak levels. VRBO and HomeAway remained the dominant Caribbean vacation rental distribution platforms while the rest of the world was only beginning to hear of a small San Francisco startup called Airbnb.

The first half of 2009 brought the full force of the global financial crisis recession to the Caribbean’s tourism and vacation rental sector. The crisis that had erupted with the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008 was now translating into sharply reduced leisure travel spending, and Jamaica’s accommodation sector — all-inclusive resorts and villa rentals alike — was feeling the impact. Airbnb, founded just months earlier, was entirely unknown in Caribbean travel markets.

The second half of 2008 began with Jamaica’s tourism sector approaching peak annual visitor numbers and ended with the global financial crisis reshaping the economic landscape. The Lehman Brothers bankruptcy of September 2008 sent shockwaves through consumer confidence and leisure travel markets. More quietly, in August 2008, three San Francisco designers had launched a website called AirBed & Breakfast — the seed of a platform that would eventually transform the Caribbean’s accommodation industry.