Discount travel Web site Hotwire.com
today announced that it concluded its record-breaking second quarter, ended June 30, 2003, with $195 million in gross bookings, up 64 percent over the first quarter of 2003.  The company reported positive net income for the quarter of $2.5 million.

Hotwire also reported strong sequential quarterly growth across each of its product lines:


- Air ticket sales grew 62 percent

- Hotel room nights sold grew 43 percent

- Rental car days sold grew 103 percent

In addition, Hotwire launched vacation packages in the second quarter, augmenting the site’s existing air, hotel and car products.

“Our growth trends in 2003 are among the top in the industry, making us the fastest-growing discount travel site today, ” said Karl Peterson
, Hotwire president and CEO.  “Strong consumer demand for deeply discounted air, hotel and car products, as well as the introduction of new offerings such as vacation packages, will drive continued growth and profitability.”

Mr. Peterson continued, “Vacation package sales are evolving as a rapidly-growing segment of online travel, and we were able to jump on to this trend by creating a unique deeply-discounted bundled product.  In just two months, packages now account for nearly 10 percent of our overall volume.”

 

Along with vacation packages, Hotwire also recently announced the launch of its last-minute Weekender package product, which bundles discount hotel rooms, rental cars and opaque air into short-notice weekend trips.  Weekender packages include time windows for flight departures and exact hotel details.

 

Related stories on ITN:

(10/07/2003) Hotwire Introduces Last-Minute Discount Vacation Packages

(07/07/2003) Hotwire Announces Partnership with Coremetrics

(09/06/2003) Hotwire Doubles Destinations for Vacation Packages

——-