Ideas, knowledge and community for a better future in Hospitality.
BYAlbert BarraHospitality · Strategy · Leadership · Marketing
Hotel distribution in 2026 can no longer be viewed as a simple battle between direct bookings and intermediaries. The real challenge is to build a profitable, coherent and sustainable commercial ecosystem, where every channel has a strategic role aligned with the hotel’s positioning, guest experience and business profitability. The priority is no longer eliminating intermediaries, but creating genuine relevance in an increasingly complex and competitive market. Technology, artificial intelligence and changing consumer behaviour have fundamentally reshaped the hotel booking journey. Distribution now depends as much on revenue management as it does on digital reputation, value proposition, guest experience and a hotel’s ability to differentiate authentically. The strongest hotels will understand distribution as the outcome of a well-executed overall strategy.
A few years ago, much of the conversation in hospitality revolved around an almost magical word: disintermediation. The ultimate goal for any hotel seemed to be to free itself from intermediaries, regain absolute control over sales and turn its own website into a perfect direct booking machine.
Today, after years of digital transformation, shifting consumer habits, the emergence of artificial intelligence, operating cost inflation, rate wars, travel marketplaces, metasearch engines, social media and increasingly unpredictable algorithms, I believe the industry is beginning to understand something important: hotel distribution was never a war between channels. It was—and remains—a matter of strategic balance.
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