CEO Brian Chesky joins us from Paris.
Brian, oh, my gosh, you must be so excited.
Yeah, it's a. We are here in the Musee d'orsay
and this clock room is incredible.
Airbnb. This is probably one of the most extraordinary Airbnb's
on earth.
Yeah. You know, you and a couple of lucky Airbnb
guests are going to literally have the best view of
the opening ceremonies because for people who don't know,
the Musee D'orsay overlooks the Sen where tonight some 90
different boats filled with the athletes are going to basically
parade down that river.
What do you think that's going to be like?
I mean, I think it's going to be like probably
the best seat in the house for the entire opening
games.
I mean, the the the center of the opening ceremony
is right behind me.
If you look out in this clock tower,
this room is obviously in the Musee D'orsay.
This is the old train station.
We converted this clock tower to what I think is
one of the coolest bedrooms on earth.
And it was designed by designer Olympic Torch and designed
almost every object in this room.
So this is truly a once in a lifetime stay.
Now, when you walk outside onto the terrace,
yes, you'll be able to overlook and see the entire
opening ceremony.
And it's going to be truly an experience you're never
going to forget.
Can you show us the room?
Because we we see a tiny slice of it,
But I want our viewers to be able to get
the real feel of what you're offering here.
Yeah. So why don't we,
why don't we zoom out here and you can start
to see right here.
So this is the famous clock tower.
And you're going to notice it's really comfortable bed behind
it.
And it's incredibly beautiful. And if we pan over a
little bit,
we'll start to see like you can see that there's
a
like all the objects in this room are designed by
the designer of the Olympic torch.
Now let's pan the other way.
And I want to show you
here
to my right is the Olympic torch,
and there's a book below it.
And that book is a custom made book that shows
the documentation of the creation of the Olympic torch.
So it was designed by the designer who designed this
room.
It's really incredible. Oh, my gosh,
that is amazing. The clock is so iconic.
And the museum beneath your feet because this is this
is up by the ceiling,
right? This special room. Yeah.
I mean, to walk to this room,
you have to walk through a room of Van Gogh's,
a room of Renoirs, a room of Cezans,
a room of Monets, some of the most iconic painting
from the, you know, late 19th century.
And so you know it,
this is this is truly one of the most extraordinary
museums on earth,
let alone in the city of Paris,
perhaps my favorite museum. And I think Liz,
like this just speaks to a larger question,
probably if the audience member might be wondering,
why are we doing this?
Well, a number of things.
Number one, it's just really cool and fun.
We like to do things that are fun and cool.
But probably more importantly, this keeps Airbnb top of mind.
It helps us reach new audiences
and it's a gateway to me becoming more than just
a place to stay because this isn't just a place
to stay,
it's an experience. And I imagine one day millions of
people are going to be able to book these incredible
experience in Airbnb.
We want to bring this magic of icons eventually to
everyone and that's one of the things we're focused on.
Well, your experience concept is,
is a stroke of actual genius when you look sort
of further down the runway
and the possibilities for revenue.
I was on your website and I saw all kinds
kinds of experiences.
There are for example, opportunities to go VIP with Kevin
Hart that sold out,
join a living room session with Doja Cat.
And to me, if you love experiences and you love
these opportunities to do something really different,
it starts right here at the Paris Olympics.
Let's talk about the record-breaking numbers that you have seen.
We know obviously that you have seen something like a
four 100%
swelling in bookings around this Olympic Games in Paris.
But what is aside from that the most surprising record
that your website has broken?
Well, Liz, this is the largest
event in Airbnb history. And to give you a sense
of how big that is,
I want, I want you to imagine the the Olympic
Stadium,
a full Olympic Stadium. Now I want you to match
and filling five of those Olympic stadiums
and that's how many people are staying in Paris during
the Olympics.
And there's there's over 150,000 homes and the cumulative guest
coming to Paris
are spending over a billion dollars in the city of
Paris.
So they got that economic impact.
So I think, you know,
there's a few of those stats,
but I think the fact that five stadiums where the
people are staying in one city,
no company to my knowledge and history,
hospitality has housed so many people in one city before.
I don't think it would have been possible before our
model.
And you also with this event were able to
cool some of the tensions,
I think with the city leaders of Paris,
thanks to the International Olympic Committee working with you and
the city to make sure that you weren't shut out
because there isn't exactly a lot of love lost between
Paris and Airbnb. I mean,
they have limited in the past the number of days
that homeowners can actually rent out their houses for short
term leasing.
And to me, I, I understand on,
on one hand, because the inventory,
at least the argument is the inventory gets soaked up
for people and who,
who have these places and are short term lenders versus
individuals who live there and want to buy a house
and it makes housing somewhat more unaffordable.
What's your counter argument to that?
Brian?
Here's my counter argument. We've run this experiment.
A year ago, New York City decided to ban Airbnb.
We're not in Airbnb right now.
And Liz, you know what?
Housing prices are up year over year,
not down as our hotel prices.
Paris decided to work much more collaboratively with us
and now look what's happening.
40% more listings in Airbnb.
The vast majority are first time host.
I would assume the vast majority of them are renting
the homes they live in.
Often I'm staying in a house here in this neighborhood
by a host is never hosted before.
It's their family home. They went to the South of
France while I'm here.
So ultimately I don't think Airbnb is the problem.
I think we can be a solution to cities problems
and we're willing to work with cities.
You know, Paris restricts. It can be
120 nights a year. I think that really makes it
economically viable for regular people to make income.
We're in favor of sensible regulations,
and I think most of the public is in support
of the sensible regulations.
Yeah, it's, it sounds like there there should be a,
a middle ground here. Before we go,
we have a whole bunch of Olympics coming up.
I mean, you got to look at,
for example, the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan,
summer 2028 in Los Angeles.
And just yesterday we heard about Salt Lake City getting
the Olympics once again.
Are you and Airbnb already getting a jump on advising
hosts on how to deal with these upcoming Olympics,
even though they're years away?
Yeah,
yeah. I mean, we're we're very focused on Milan.
We're very focused on LA.
And I actually think the interesting thing is the smaller
the city,
the more they're going to benefit from Airbnb.
Take a city like Salt Lake City.
Salt Lake City is a much smaller city
in Milan. It's got significantly fewer hotels.
So a city like that,
more than even Milan, especially more than Paris,
is going to really depend on Airbnb to provide excess
capacity and allow people to be introduced over to me
for the first time.
Brian, good luck. And it looks amazing behind you,
the famed clock of the Musee d'orsay
room service there would be great.
A couple of croissants and some chocolate show.
Let's see what you guys can do.
Thank you so much.