The Future of Value, Travel Edition

Travel options are becoming increasingly granular, both in time and space.

Just as one person once owned a vast amount of land and now a smaller area is home to more than a million people, so, too, travel options can become increasingly small.

For instance, Hilton has launched a micro-hotel chain called Motto. “The average Motto guest room will be 163 square feet, which is about half the size of a room in Hampton by Hilton.”

One source of inspiration for this idea are hostels in Europe, a form of shared accommodation. (An airplane travel companion from Europe recently explained to me that hostels provide lockers for storing one's belongings.)

I remember visiting the UK in 1997 and everything there felt smaller than I knew in Florida or Tennessee. This also shed light on family we had visiting from the UK once who noted how they “could feel the vastness of this country” when they stepped off the plane in Orlando.

Hotel stays are also increasingly short in duration. An overnight stay is no longer assumed. Microstays allow rooms to be rented more than once a day.