Limehome turns commercial properties into designer apartments and rents them out through their own platform. Josef Vollmayr said in our #CoronaUpdate:
“We’re not only a digital company, but also at our core a digital chain of hotels that covers the entire value added chain.”
He and his Limehome co-founder Lars Stäbe had always said their business model is highly resistant to crisis, remarked Vollmayr, because people will always travel:
“That indeed changed over night. After the initial shock, however, things went extremely well. While classic hotels were no longer able to cover their fixed costs and remained closed over a very long period of time, we have very lean cost structures on site.”
Moreover, a guest’s entire stay is digital and contactless. With the self-sufficiency it provides, the product “is perfect for the current situation.”
Limehome views corona as a “major opportunity”
At the zenith of the crisis, the occupancy rate declined significantly, reported Vollmayr. But the startup has since returned to their pre-crisis level. They also used the time during corona for their expansion:
“Because we went live with several locations, our revenue actually grew by 75 percent compared to the time before corona.”
And that is why the founder also views the crisis as a “major opportunity”:
“We think market shares are made during times of crisis in particular.”
Looking back over the past months, Josef Vollmayr said:
“Corona was the absolute litmus test for our model, our product and ultimately our team as well.”
In the complete #CoronaUpdate, Josef Vollmayr also talks about how he assesses further development in the hotel market and why hotel guests benefit from the current crisis: