Hospitality Club
| Part ofa serieson |
| Homestays |
|---|
| Hospitality exchange services |
| Hospitality for work |
| Hospitality for money |
| Home exchangeand others |
| Area served | Global |
|---|---|
| Owner | Veit Kühne |
| Founder(s) | Veit Kühne |
| Products | Homestay |
| Services | Social networking service |
| Launched | July 11, 2000 |
| Current status | Offline |
Hospitality Club(HC) was ahospitality exchange service(agift economynetwork for findinghomestayswhereby hosts were not allowed to charge forlodging) accessible via a website. HC's specified goals were to facilitate "intercultural understanding... bringing people together... travelers and locals".[1]
History
[edit]
Hospitality Club was founded in July 2000 inKoblenz,by Veit Kühne, who was inspired by a trip to South America.[2][3][4][5]It later incorporated technology from Hospex.org, a similar service.[6]
In 2005, a disagreement between some members of Hospitality Club and its founder led to the foundation ofBeWelcome.[7]Many HC members, who became volunteers withinCouchsurfing,left HC towards CS because of its missing legal status and insufficient management transparency.[8]
In February 2006, Kühne was working full-time on Hospitality Club.[9]In the spring of 2006, an event took place inRigawith 430 participants from 36 countries.[10]
As of July 2006, the site had 155,000 members.[11]This number grew by around 1,000 new members a week in 2006.[10]
In 2007,Google Trendssearch volume for hospitalityclub.org started to decline and was overtaken by the search volume forCouchSurfing.[12]
In 2008, HC had more than 400,000 members from 200 countries.[4]
In 2013, HC had more than a half of million members from 200 countries.[13]
By 2017, only one third of members were still active.[3]
By April 2022, the website was completely offline.[14]
Safety measures
[edit]Hospitality Club had areputation system,whereby members left references for others.[10]For added safety, members were encouraged to check each other's passports, although it rarely happened.[4]
References
[edit]- ^"The Hospitality Club"– viaLiveJournal.
- ^"Netzwerk eines Träumers"[Network of a dreamer].Der Spiegel.2 August 2006.
- ^abCalderara, Jesko (2 August 2017)."Ein umstrittenes Geschäftsmodell"[A controversial business model].St. Galler Tagblatt(in Swiss High German).
- ^abcBaker, Vicky (27 June 2008)."Top 10 hospitality travel sites".The Guardian.
- ^Rodemann, Julian (29 March 2016)."Couchsurfing mit Haken"[Couchsurfing with a hook].Die Welt.
- ^"Welcome to HOSPEXerver".Hospex.org.
- ^Baker, Vicky (18 April 2008)."Going local in Caracas, Venezuela".The Guardian.
- ^o'Regan, Michael; Choe, Jaeyeon (2019-04-01)."Managing a non-profit hospitality platform conversion: The case of Couchsurfing"(PDF).Tourism Management Perspectives.30:138–146.doi:10.1016/j.tmp.2019.02.018.ISSN2211-9736.S2CID150755845.Retrieved28 May2021.
- ^Thomas, Amelia (28 February 2006)."Backstory: Extreme vacation".Christian Science Monitor.
- ^abc"Freunde in der Fremde"[Friends abroad].Stern(in German). 27 January 2006.
- ^Stellin, Susan (July 9, 2006)."Go to Strangers (and They'll Come to You)".The New York Times.
- ^Rustam Tagiew; Dmitry I. Ignatov; Radhakrishnan Delhibabu (2015).Hospitality Exchange Services as a Source of Spatial and Social Data?.(IEEE) International Conference on Data Mining Workshop (ICDMW). Atlantic City. pp. 1125–1130.doi:10.1109/ICDMW.2015.239.
- ^Локша, Анна Владимировна (2013)."О необходимости повышения социальной составляющей молодежного туризма в России".Телескоп: Журнал Социологических И Маркетинговых Исследований(in Russian) (5).ISSN1994-3776.
- ^"Der Hospitality Club – ein Nachruf"[The Hospitality Club – an obituary].unsere-zeitung.at(in Austrian German). 24 August 2022.
External links
[edit]- A podcast about hospitality clubon GermanRTL