A few months ago, chatter reached the Travel desk of a new daily email clogging up the nation’s inboxes. It was from a company called Groupon.
Frankly, we weren’t impressed. “Groupons” are group coupons — special offers and discounts that come into effect only if enough people take up the offer. So you might get an email telling you a local nail bar is doing 10 fingers for the price of five, but only if 100 people book in the next 24 hours. You decide whether to join the critical mass (and possibly email your friends about the deal, earning you a further £6 voucher for future use for every chum who gets their nails done). It’s proved a wildly successful idea, earning Groupon (which takes a commission on every deal) £312m in revenues last year, and the title of “the fastest-growing company in history”.
It might sound fine, but we found that most of Groupon’s offers seemed to come from buffet restaurants, beauty salons and, oddly, falconry days. Deals on hotels and holidays were notable by their absence. Not much use to us, we thought.
Then, last week, a Groupon email arrived offering two nights in a double room in an Art’otel in Berlin, B&B, with a dinner for two thrown in, for £195 — a full 50% off. More than 1,100 people jumped in during the next 24 hours. A thousand breaks snapped up in a day?
A few other accommodation deals have been cropping up, too: a seafront hotel in Brighton, which normally charges £169 a night for B&B and a view, offering it for £68; a country house in Cumbria offering a £205 dinner-bed-and-breakfast stay for £79; a room and a spa treatment in a health resort near Chester for £99, down from £305. All of the above shifted nearly 1,000 deals in a day.
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Ooh, interesting. Are deals from Groupon (and its many upstart rivals) going to be the future of travel discounts? Quite possibly, yes — it’s a great way for hotels to shift unsold rooms. Still, we would advise caution. A trawl through TripAdvisor reveals that “Groupon stays” vary enormously: testimonies range from “We were treated like second-class guests” to “We actually felt bad paying so little”. The firm’s emails are designed to inspire impulse purchases — so resist the impulse and do your research.
Three crucial words appear in most deals: “Subject to availability.” Which can mean three more: “Forget Saturday nights.” Try to book your room the instant you buy your voucher — if you can’t get a reservation that suits you, Groupon will refund within seven days of purchase.
It seems this phenomenon might be the future of the little travel treat — a midweek escape or half a cheap weekend. If a trip really matters, though, an old rule applies: look for the value, not the discount.