Let’s create travel technology solutions to be proud of this Pride Month

Pride Month fills my personal and social life with pride about my identity as a married gay man. But as a travel technology professional you know what doesn’t make me proud? The woeful lack of technology that addresses the needs of LGTBQ+ travelers around the world.

During Pride Month, and to a lesser extent during the rest of the year, many travel companies create marketing that appeals to LGTBQ+ personas.

But that’s not the same as making experiences, from inspiration to booking to experiencing the product to post-trip, that actually have LGTBQ+ audiences in mind.

To make a comparison, that would be like having an advertisement saying you welcome people with disabilities but then not having wheelchair access.

But with many of the major online travel portals, be they an online travel agency or hotel or airline or other provider selling direct to consumers, that’s really the experience LGTBQ+ users have: We “tolerate” you but aren’t actually doing anything to meet your needs.

Of course, we can’t blame travel technology companies for the fact that homophobes and intolerant people exist, or that there’s arguably an increase in such hateful views. In the United Kingdom, for example, hate crimes against transgender people have hit a record high in England and Wales, according to The Guardian. This includes the travel experience, and for LGTBQ+ travelers stepping out of their current environment and into the unknown is even more worrying than for heterosexuals.

In 2022, Booking.com did research on this and suggested some improvements. A year later, we published another in-depth study and, worryingly, found that the average “safety indicator” for LGBTQ+ travelers was 3.5 out of 5, well below the heterosexual average of 4.1. 

Nor is it the fault of the travel technology companies that this is a complex challenge to resolve. Homosexuality is illegal in a great many countries around the world, particularly places you might want to go on holiday. This means that for the travel businesses themselves in some countries they might find problems too – for example, in Russia it is illegal to promote homosexuality to anyone under 18, making it impossible to publicly celebrate Gay Pride or encourage inclusivity among customers or staff for fear of prosecution. Equally, a technology tool – say, for instance, a filter or LGTBQ+ user feedback scoring – might receive backlash or even fines or criminal proceedings in some markets.

This also raises data protection issues; many governments around the world demand access to communications and data, some of which may well – directly or inadvertently – reveal that someone is homosexual. And then there is always the possibility that they could alienate the “anti-woke” types (just look at the Bud Lite backlash last year) and see losses as a result. A company with no customers can’t change attitudes; they have to make money. We understand.

So what do I think that the travel technology industry can do to begin bringing justice to the needs of LGTBQ+ travelers? First would be having a LGTBQ+ chief officer at big travel tech companies to test and enforce user experience, product development, customer care, etc. Right now, the chief LGBTQ+ functions, where they exist, are more like human resources roles.

Many in our community would welcome greater promises of data protection and clear policies related to thinking through what kind of data is collected that could be very concerning (resulting in criminal conviction, or being subjected to violence) if it arrived in the hands of the wrong government or group.

Next up, during the actual search and booking phase of a trip, data on homophobic incidents could be made available in the search phase. This data is already available from non-governmental organizations and community groups, we just need to implement it.

Meanwhile, LGTBQ+ feedback and reviews could be made available on mainstream platforms, particularly for properties, as now you must go to LGTBQ+ specialist websites for any reliable (if any) feedback. The reality is that LGBTQ+ travelers currently are forced to create their own platforms like Gayhomestay or Misterbnb. Equally, we’d like more guides that are integrated into the online travel experience. The content is out there, gay communities already write their own travel guides.

And here is one easy fix worry for many: Stop asking for gender in the booking confirmation process! All credit due to Booking.com for not asking this. Please follow this lead, other platforms.

To give an example of how confusing things can be, Expedia offers “LGBTQ welcoming” properties. That’s a great initiative. But it's hard to understand how it works, as it still suggests quite a few “LGBTQ welcoming” properties in Riyadh, for example, including local hotel brands. This while Statista ranks Saudi Arabia highest in its index of the most dangerous travel destinations for LGBT tourism worldwide in 2023. There’s evidence of an anti-gay law being enforced in recent years. 

Hopefully, no one needs persuading of the moral reason for making the kinds of changes I’m outlining. But you might be wondering what the economic benefits could look like. After all, we’re all working in companies and money talks.

The economic opportunity is not just about the minority who are LGTBQ+, significant as they are in number globally (and plenty of studies show them to have higher than average disposable incomes). But also think about the groups traveling with people within them that are LGTBQ+ or companies that want to ensure all their staff feel welcome in the same way. Imagine how if you can meet the needs of this quite sizeable group, then you can gain their loyalty, the holy grail of marketing. And brands that do the right thing benefit long-term. Certainly they gain the first mover advantage.

Of course, in recent years we’ve seen some really welcome advances in the visibility of LGTBQ+ audiences around the world, and travel has kept up with that. Just look at Airbnb's campaign in Australia and an Expedia ad from 2013. But it would be dangerous to think that the challenge has been completed. It has not. Now is the moment that we must go from “tolerance” to actually adjusting to the real needs of LGTBQ+ travelers.

The technology industry has made enormous advances in innovation in just the past few years. If this June Pride Month we can promise to start using some of that innovation to fulfill the important needs of LGTBQ+ travelers, that would be something we could celebrate that has an impact all year long.