GMH Hotels: Airbnb Just Got Serious About Hotels
Good Morning Hospitality
05/27/26
•27m
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On this week's Good Morning Hospitality, A Skift Podcast: Hotels Edition, Sarah Dandashy and Steve Turk break down a week where three big stories all pointed at the same shift: the distribution, loyalty, and infrastructure layers of hospitality are all getting reshuffled at once.
The conversation opens with Airbnb naming Andrea D'Amico, an 18-year Booking.com veteran, as its new VP of Hotels, and what that hire says about how seriously Airbnb is coming for the boutique and independent hotel market.
From there, Sarah and Steve dig into why boutique brands like Room Mate Hotels are running out of room on loyalty, and what the SpaceX IPO filing reveals about how deeply STARLINK has already embedded itself into travel's connectivity infrastructure.
This episode is presented by Plusgrade & Bilt. Visit plusgrade.com to learn more.
And for hotels with restaurants and restaurant owners, Bilt Hospitality is finally here. Go to joinbilt.com/gmh to learn more.
Previous Episode
On this special holiday episode of Good Morning Hospitality, Brandy Canaley and Michael Goldin unpack one of the biggest shifts happening in travel right now: AI-powered booking. Joined by Jason Cincotta, founder of Kismet, the conversation breaks down Google’s new push into agentic hotel booking, what it means to become “AI-bookable,” and why independent hotels and vacation rentals may need to rethink how they show up online.
The episode also dives into Airbnb’s massive Summer Release, including boutique hotels, AI-powered review tools, airport pickups, grocery delivery, rental cars, and the company’s expanding push toward becoming a full trip platform. Michael and Brandy debate whether Airbnb’s latest features are meaningful product evolution or just great PR, while also exploring how AI could reshape direct bookings, loyalty, and the future of travel planning.
This episode is presented by Plusgrade & Bilt. Visit plusgrade.com to learn more.
And for hotels with restaurants and restaurant owners, Bilt Hospitality is finally here. Go to joinbilt.com/gmh to learn more.
Next Episode
On Monday's Good Morning Hospitality, A Skift Podcast, Brandreth Canaley, Michael Goldin, and Jamie Lane break down a week where the infrastructure of hospitality is being stress-tested from every direction.
The conversation opens with a sobering security story: scammers are using real guest reservation data to launch highly targeted phishing attacks, with at least 350 hotels and vacation rentals across 50 countries already caught up.
From there, the team digs into Mews and SiteMinder's new native integration, which is designed to break down the data silos holding hotels back from AI adoption, and closes with Expedia Group's partnership with IShowSpeed and what it signals about where Gen Z travel discovery is actually happening.
This episode is presented by Cloudbeds & Bilt. Visit cloudbeds.com/gmh to learn more.
And for hotels with restaurants and restaurant owners, Bilt Hospitality is finally here. Go to joinbilt.com/gmh to learn more.
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