Benchmarking of Airbnb listings: How competitive is the sharing economy sector of European cities?

Abstract

Airbnb is arguably the world’s most popular accommodation sharing platform. Its impact on demand and supply within the tourism and hospitality industry is nowadays unquestionable. The present study delves into inspecting the efficiency of Airbnb listings of European cities, as, in spite of the success of Airbnb as a whole, it cannot be presupposed that all listings are equally successful. More specifically, data envelopment analysis (DEA) is employed in this first comprehensive benchmarking attempt within the domain of the sharing economy to date. This article also makes a contribution to robustness by introducing an interactivity note to the base model, thus, inspecting the results for corroboration/discrepancies and going beyond the static analyses that are common in DEA modeling. Ultimately, this is done with the goal of highlighting opportunities for inefficient Airbnb listings to properly utilize their inputs and therefore become more competitive.