Hostelling at global and national levels

Abstract

The current state of the global hostel market is characterized. It has been established that the global hostel market reached USD 4.1 billion in 2022. The leader in the hostel market is the Asia–Pacific region, which is experiencing active recovery in international tourism following the COVID–19 pandemic. The European region ranks second, followed by the Americas. It has been determined that the largest share of hostel guests consists of individuals aged 25 to 34. The TOP–5 hostel networks in the world as of 2022 were: a&o Hostels, Zostel, Meininger, St Christopher’s Inns, and Nomads World. The current state of hostelling in Ukraine is analyzed. It has been established that at the present stage, under the conditions of Russian aggression in Ukraine, official statistics do not reflect the actual number of hostel establishments. The review of the hostel base was conducted based on online booking websites. Hotelmix offers guests hostels in 20 cities of Ukraine, totaling 272 hostels. The largest number of hostels is located in Kyiv (39.3% of the total number of available hostels), followed by Lviv (20%) and Odesa in third place (7.4%). Booking.com offers guests 275 hostels in various regions of Ukraine. It was found that not all hostels are listed on official online booking platforms. A SWOT–analysis of hostel businesses was conducted. Positive changes in the hostel market require joint actions from government bodies and hostel operators. Combined efforts from both sides will ensure measures at the national level to improve hostel operations and advance the hostel industry to a new stage of development, while simultaneously preventing the influence of negative factors arising from the weaknesses in hostel operations (lack of service quality standards, the mass emergence of economy–class hotels in the market, insufficient information on hostel services, lack of legislative regulation for hostel operations) and threats (oversaturation of the market with hostel services, travelers' changing preferences toward more comfortable accommodations, the growth of the 2–3 star hotel segment, which offers an alternative to hostels, lack of government support, and a decrease in investment flows).