The hospitality and tourism industry has changed more than a little since the first motel, in San Luis Obispo, California, was opened in 1925. (Its rooms went for $2.50 a night.) Today, there are more than four million guest rooms in the country, and tourists and businesspeople spend about $550 billion each year on travel in the United States. The industry includes behemoths like Marriott, Hilton, Six Flags, and Disneyland and Walt Disney World, on down to out-of-the-way bed-and-breakfasts and roadside attractions like the Liberace Museum (in Las Vegas), the Cadillac Ranch (Amarillo, Texas), and the Dan Quayle Center and Museum (Huntington, Indiana). Which means that the Gideons, who placed their first Bible in a hotel room in 1908, have a lot more work to do than they used to. But they're not the only ones. Today, the industry employs more than seven million people directly and even more than that indirectly. (For example, consider a waiter in a restaurant in Palm Springs, California, which is in the middle of the desert: His job wouldn't exist if it weren't for the fact that Palm Springs is a tourist destination.) Accountants, nurses, salespeople, lifeguards, park rangers, street cleaners, car rental agents, blackjack dealers, caterers, cruise directors, the actress in the Snow White costume, the clerk in the t-shirt shack, the tennis pro, the golf course groundskeeper-the industry employs these folks and many, many more. Despite the size and complexity of the industry, today many of its arms are interconnected by technology. Computer systems now allow people to reserve airline tickets, rental cars, hotel rooms, and tours-all at the same time. These computer systems are called computer reservation systems (CRSs) or global distribution systems (GDSs). Although many in the industry work in behind-the-scenes positions, those on the front lines-travel agents, front desk clerks, tour guides, and so on-must be enthusiastic and articulate. And in most any position, you'll need to have a love of service and a strong attention to detail. In the end, your job is about how satisfied you've made the customer. Recovery? It's been a very difficult few years for the hospitality and tourism industry. The economic recession has caused businesses, individuals, and families to cut back on their spending on travel, and fears of terrorism have made many folks even less inclined to travel. The results have included lower industry revenues, layoffs, and a tighter job market. Today, though, there are signs that people are starting to travel more and that the industry may be recovering. Industry analysts are expecting increasing demand for hotel rooms and seats on airline flights in 2004, with an increase in job opportunities in many sectors of the industry. The Internet The biggest change in the travel industry in recent years has been the rise of the Internet. It used to be that you had to speak with your travel agent, or call hotels and airlines directly, to make your travel plans. But as Internet usage spread, it became possible to use the new technology to research destinations and compare prices yourself, or visit websites that provide all that information in one place. Indeed, companies such as Expedia and Travelocity have become quite profitable doing just that. In 2003, 12 percent of lodging reservations were made online, and that number is sure to grow in coming years. One of the changes wrought by the Internet has been to make the travel agent and reservations clerk less necessary to making travel plans. According to industry experts, the Internet has also raised the number of rooms occupied per night-but it's also caused lower revenue per room, as the ease of Internet comparison shopping and Internet-only promos have increased competition among hospitality providers. Niche Markets As in many other industries, the big players in the hospitality and tourism industry have become vastly more efficient due to technology and management advances in recent years. These days, smaller players just can't compete on price. So how can smaller hotels, motels, and tour operators compete with bigger players who pay half what they do for supplies? For many smaller players, the answer is finding a market niche that is not adequately served by the big players and becoming a specialist in providing services for that niche. Although some market niches are already served by big industry players (think: golf resorts, or tour operators who put together trips to New York City to see Broadway plays), there are plenty of niches that smaller players focus on. For example, there are tour operators that focus on the gay male market, Christian- or Jewish-focused Jerusalem-tour packagers, back country-skiing tour guides, ecotourism resorts, and so on. If you love travel and have a passion for a certain place or activity, it's likely you'll be able to find a company that operates in that niche. The only problem is that many of these companies will be so small that they'll rarely have an open position for you to fill. Hospitality and tourism is a big, hard-to-pin-down industry that actually consists of 15 or more specific sectors, including car rentals, restaurants, convention and meeting planning, airlines, State and National Parks, convention and visitor bureaus, and tour operators. That's way too much for us to look at here, though, so we'll stick to the following core sectors of the industry: Lodging The lodging sector, which serves both vacationers and business travelers and which made $103 billion in revenue in 2002, consists of hotels, motels, bed-and-breakfast providers, hostels, and the like: places where you can stay the night. Lodging types include budget accommodations (e.g., EconoLodge, Super 8, and Motel 6), midpriced lodgings (e.g., Sheraton, Marriott), and high-end luxury hotels (e.g., W Hotels, Ritz-Carlton), as well as hostels, campgrounds, and bed-and-breakfasts. Major players in this sector include Carlson Companies, Cendant, Hilton, Marriott, Starwood Hotels & Resorts, Accor, and Choice Hotels. Resorts These are destinations built around a specific activity (e.g., golf or skiing), attraction (e.g., Walt Disney World), or target demographic (e.g., Club Med destinations for singles and families, respectively). Unlike the lodgings sector, this sector is focused squarely on the vacation market and includes timeshare accommodations. Big players here include Walt Disney Parks & Resorts, Club Med, Sandals, Fairfield Resorts, Bluegreen Corp., Intrawest Corp., Vail Resorts, and American Skiing Co. Gambling Las Vegas, Reno, and Atlantic City used to be the only places that came to mind when you mentioned the word "casino," but in recent years this sector has been growing in places from Louisiana to North Dakota and from Florida to California. Gaming businesses include casinos, riverboat casinos, racetracks, and racetrack casinos (or "racinos"). Casinos can be stand-alone attractions, or can be combined with lodging facilities (and in some cases, such as Vegas's New York New York, nongambling attractions) to make gambling resorts. This sector employed 351,000 people in 2002. Big players here include Harrah's, MGM Mirage, Caesar's, Mandalay Resort Group, and Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts. Attractions This sector comprises all the places you might visit as your primary destination while on vacation, as well as all those places you might stop to check out en route to your primary destination. In other words, everything from amusement parks (for instance, Disneyland) and roadside attractions (such as the Salem Witch Museum) to notable natural landscapes (the Grand Canyon), famous or historical buildings (Graceland, the Alamo), and in some cases entire towns or cities (Branson, Missouri). Big players in this sector include the National Parks Service, Walt Disney Parks & Resorts, Busch Entertainment Corp., Paramount Parks, Universal Parks & Entertainment, Six Flags, Cedar Fair, and ClubCorp. Travel Agencies and Travel Packagers Travel agents and packagers help travelers plan their business trips and vacations. Travel agents help business travelers and tourists plan and purchase everything from airline tickets and car rentals to resort stays and attraction tickets. Travel packagers put together trips for individual tourists or groups of tourists, arranging for everything from hotel stays and restaurant reservations to tours guides, theater reservations, and sports lessons. Smaller travel agencies and packagers are more likely to focus on a single market, activity, or location. For example, one travel packager might focus on singles tours, another might offer only surf tours, and another may concentrate on tours of Asia. Major players in this category include American Express, Cendant, Expedia, Orbitz, Travelocity, Carlson Wagonlit Travel, WorldTravel, Maritz Inc., and World Travel Specialists Group. Cruise Lines Cruise lines are included in this profile because while other modes of transportation, like airlines, are primarily about getting passengers from place to place, on a cruise ship the trip is the focus. Indeed, cruise ships are essentially floating resorts, with all the activities and amenities of resorts of every kind. Major players here include Carnival, Royal Caribbean, Norwegian Cruise Lines, Royal Olympic, and Star Cruises. The outlook in the hospitality and tourism industry varies depending on the position and sector you're interested in working in: Opportunities in hospitality, which have been fewer than usual during the recent economic downturn, are projected to grow at a slightly greater rate than jobs overall between 2000 and 2010. For travel agents, the outlook isn't nearly so bright, due to the growing popularity of travel websites for planning trips and making reservations among both individual and corporate travelers. Of course, the hospitality and tourism industry is especially sensitive to the overall economy; when things are tough in the economy, businesspeople tend to travel less, and would-be vacationers tend to scale back their travel plans, if not cancel them altogether. Events of global significance, such as terrorist attacks and disease epidemics, can also hurt the travel business. Be aware that, occasionally, the industry will go into a downturn, and that when that happens nobody's job is completely safe. A final note: Adventure travel is one particularly hot spot in the travel business these days. Competition is tough for positions in this sector, but jobs here should continue to grow in coming years.