Accor’s luxury home rentals group tries to take a chunk out of Airbnb

Accor’s luxury home-sharing brand, Onefinestay, is launching a new program designed to keep bookings from wealthy clients coming: a personal butler, available for a year after the vacation is over.

The service, which caters to would-be Airbnb guests who are looking for high-end properties, was founded in 2009. Its new loyalty program, called Higher Living, springboards off the concierges that are available to any guest staying at one of Onefinestay’s 10,000 properties world-wide, reports Bloomberg.

“When I learned how many times our guests and travel planners communicate during the booking process, I realized that we get such a high degree of information,” says Onefinestay CEO Javier Cedillo-Espin to Bloomberg. “We get into your life, so we’d like to make sure we’re acting on it.”

Onefinestay, acquired by Accor in 2016, makes the hotel operator the first to get into the home-sharing market, albeit on the high-end scale. In addition to the concierge, personal chefs and toiletries like Le Labo and L’Occitane make the experience feel curated.

Though Airbnb has cornered the market of homesharing — the company has 4 million listings in 65,000 different destinations — the luxury market is new to them. Although Airbnb has signaled some interest in moving into the high-end market with its recent acquisition of a Canadian peer-to-peer luxury home rental company which will bring their dedicated high-end offerings to 4,000. [Bloomberg] — Erin Hudson