From the category archives:

tourism

This year has not been good for any of the Industry, except I guess for Medical Industry in India (Thanks to Swine Flu, recession related diseases :)). The tourism in India has seen a steep decline over last 12 months and the effects of that have seen Hospitality Industry in India cut to [...]

{ 1 comment }

Indian Tourism Industry on a downward trend?

by Arun Prabhudesai
palace on wheels

The tourism statistics in the first quarter and up to MAY’09 as compiled by the Department of Tourism shows a sharp decline in the industry by a whopping 40-45%. This depressing situation can either be defended by obvious reasons which every sector seems to be falling trap to. i.e. Recession or specifically for this [...]

5 comments August 9, 2009 Continue Reading →

Travel Thursday: India News Digest

by Arun Prabhudesai
India Travel Thursday

Travel Thursday is our weekly news Digest that brings you buzzing stories about Travel & Tourism in India. We start this Travel Thursday with some great positive News ! Udaipur is Voted as the World’s Best city for travellers – WOW ! Now thats [...]

7 comments July 16, 2009 Continue Reading →

Travel Thursday: India News Digest

by Arun Prabhudesai
India Business Blog travel

If you are new to Travel Thursday, here is a short explanation of what it is.

This will be the first edition of our Weekly News Digest of Travel Thursday.

 India Business Blog travel


Chartered Flights to Watch Solar Eclipse..WTF !

Yes, you heard me right, the notion of Solar Eclipse being a bad omen seems to be fading away.

Indians in large numbers, are now actually hiring Chartered flights to see Solar Eclipse, so that they can view it without any disturbance as for as long as possible.

2 comments July 9, 2009 Continue Reading →

Internet on the bus, courtesy – Google

by Sriram Vadlamani
Google_bus1

Euphoria over Google Ocean an addition from Google where you can see what’s on the seabed hasn’t died yet. Google is out with yet another innovation of its own. This innovation is not a software or a new addition to the already feature rich Gmail. It is a bus, equipped with stuff to educate people [...]

0 comments February 3, 2009 Continue Reading →

Now Indian Railways introduces Chartered Trains to boost tourism!

by Sriram Vadlamani
Indian train Luxury

Chartered : hired for the exclusive temporary use of a group of travelers; “a chartered plane”; “the chartered buses arrived on time”
I tried looking for the meaning of ‘Chartered” using define:chartered in Google and that is what I got. The definition mentions about a plane and a bus. No mention of a train. I bet [...]

1 comment January 31, 2009 Continue Reading →

IXIGO’s launches hotel search Engine

by Arun Prabhudesai
Hotel Booking site

iXiGO, an Indian travel aggregator has announced the launch of its hotel search engine, a natural progression for their travel search.

As per the press release, ixigo hotel search engine can search and book accommodation in real time across 4500 hotels in 320 Indian cities.

XiGO’s hotel search accesses more than 30 leading national and international hotel booking websites, enabling comparisons of room tariffs of the same hotel across multiple sites within a few seconds. The hotel search engine sorts accommodation by price, star ratings, amenities and allows detailed views for maps and photos; all in a single webpage. An instant keyword search on names, addresses and filters on best value within hotels narrows down the search – features so far restricted to only select international travel portals.

I tried doing couple of searches for hotels in Bangalore and results were decent enough. Being purely a search engine, the visitors will have to visit the parent hotel booking site to do the booking.

1 comment April 9, 2008 Continue Reading →

Cleartrip.com: The most user-friendly OTA in India

by Arun Prabhudesai
Indian OTA Alexa Comparison

Last year I did a comparison of 10 OTA’s operating in India. The comparison was done based on 5 different parameters like Ticket fares, Flight options, Destinations, User Friendliness and value added services. In that comparison IXIGO scored quite well on most aspects including user friendliness. Cleartrip and Yatra also got good points on user friendliness aspect.

However, in a recent survey conducted by Juxtconsult, Cleartrip seems to have taken a lead over other OTA rivals in terms of user friendliness. The JuxtConsult survey conducted on the online travel portals involved most of the leading players in the OTA category – Cleartrip, Makemytrip, Yatra, Travelguru and Indiatimes Travel (surprisingly IXIGO was not included in the survey). To measure the ‘Website User-Friendliness’ Index, respondents were asked to rate the travel portals on 19 distinct parameters under 4 categories: ease of access, design appeal, ease of usage and usage satisfaction.

Cleartrip came out the winner in their research.

12 comments March 19, 2008 Continue Reading →

Now Free Internet access and Satellite television on Indian Rails

by Arun Prabhudesai

Indian Union Railway minister -Lalu Prasad Yadav – the darling of the masses and the favorite whipping-boy of the media has added another feather to Indian railways.

Two premium trains of India – Shatabdi and Rajdhani – will now be boasting on-board free internet and direct-to-home (DTH) services.

The premium trains have been consistently loosing market share over past couple of years to low cost budget airlines offering very competitive rates. In a bid to stem this loosing streak, the Indian railway minister is expected to announce many new initiatives including Free Internet access and DTH services.

4 comments February 19, 2008 Continue Reading →

Planning a trip to Goa or Kerala for the New Year Weekend? Think Again!

by Arun Prabhudesai

Indians are getting richer and so are prices, from real estate to common commodities, all soaring through the roof.
Even going on a vacation within India is more expensive than going for a short trip Singapore, Bankok or Sri Lanka.

6 comments December 28, 2007 Continue Reading →

A unique travel package: Tour Asia’s largest slum – Dharavi

by Arun Prabhudesai
guided Dharavi Tours

I do cover a lot of online travel agencies and destinations on this blog, but most of them cover elite and traditional travel destinations. But today’s post talks about a place that is known for poverty and notoriety.
I accidentally stumbled upon this site of a traditional travel agency that offers guided tours to Dharavi….yes, Dharavi – The largest slum in Asia.
I was amazed when I read that because Dharavi is not a place where you would ideally like to be in most circumstances (at least that’s what most of us think!).

7 comments November 15, 2007 Continue Reading →

Indian Online Travel Industry is buzzing!

by Arun Prabhudesai
IXIGO Comparison search

Indian OTAs (Online travel agents) are in news again. With more than 70% of e-commerce spend happening purely on online travel booking, this space is getting quite lucrative.
With the number of Online Travel agents reaching double figures, it is getting quite competitive too. To move ahead of the competition, ClearTrip, Yatra and IXIGO have come up with new features to attract more audience.

5 comments November 10, 2007 Continue Reading →

Ecommerce in India: Have you shopped online yet?

by Arun Prabhudesai
Growing ecommerce in India

As per the report released by Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) and IMRB International, the total online transactions in India stood at Rs. 7080 crores (approx $1.75 billion) for 2006/2007 and is expected to grow by 30% to touch 9210 crores (approx $2.15 billion) by 2007/2008.

13 comments October 9, 2007 Continue Reading →

Ugly, yet excellent Indian Travel Search Engine !

by Arun Prabhudesai
90DI travel logo

I am surprised that in this day and age we have Travel search engine looking like 90DI. I don’t know how many of you would agree with me, but I found the look of this excellent travel search engine bit too amateurish. It is also quite glaring, because even though it is ugly, it is one of the better travel searches in Indian Travel sector, and I can say that I seen most, if not all the Indian players in this sector.

12 comments October 1, 2007 Continue Reading →

India crowned World’s No. 1 Travel Destination!

by Arun Prabhudesai
Incredible India Logo campaign

The leading UK Authority, Condé Nast Traveler UK, has announced that India tops the list of preferred travel destination in the world.
This feat has been achieved for the first time in history of Indian Tourism. Surely, it is great moment and pride for all of us Indians and we should rejoice it whole heartedly.

2 comments September 7, 2007 Continue Reading →
who's online