Challenges
Manual workload: Wasting hours manually updating pricing and property content channel by channel
Sync failures: Experiencing weekly overbookings due to an unreliable iCal calendar sync.
Missed demand: Failing to capture high-value international travelers through specialist channels.
Today, Rentals United is much more than an additional layer in our tech stack. "It acts as the central distribution hub connecting our PMS and internal tools to a large ecosystem of OTAs and specialist channels.
Solutions
Results
The results were immediate and measurable. After fully leveraging Rental United's open API they eliminated the manual work and accessed high-value international demand driving a +30% Average Daily Rate (ADR) and significantly extend booking windows without adding operational complexity.
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listing sites connected30
Higher ADR
Cocoonr' story
Managing a vast portfolio of +4,500 properties across an entire country requires a delicate balance of centralized efficiency and on-the-ground expertise.
Founded in September 2015 by Antoine Serrurier, Cocoonr.fr has mastered this balance, operating across the entirety of France.
Cocoonr stands out by combining national scale with robust local operations through a network of 22 local agencies in destinations like Rennes, Toulouse, Bordeaux, Paris, and Annecy.
Centralized experts at their Rennes headquarters handle revenue management, distribution, finance, customer support, and technology. Local teams focus on what they do best: owner relationships, operations, and the guest experience.
Their portfolio of approximately 4,500 properties, from which 2,800 apartments and 1,800 houses, spans urban, coastal, countryside, and mountain destinations across the entirety of France, served through two offerings: Cocoonr Gestion (full-service property management) and Cocoonr Distribution (distribution services for self-managing owners).
To sustain growth at that scale, Cocoonr needed to diversify its audience without adding operational complexity. Getting there required a fundamental rethink of their distribution infrastructure.
The Challenge
Eight years ago, Cocoonr was operating in a completely different world.
Back then, a basic iCal-based channel manager was all it took to keep things running smoothly. Digital calendars synced up, bookings trickled in, and life was simple. But success has a way of breaking old habits. As their portfolio grew and attracting owners became much easier, that once-reliable iCal sync started cracking under the pressure.
Pricing had to be updated channel by channel. Property content: photos, descriptions, setup – had to be uploaded manually to each OTA, one listing at a time. Overbookings were happening every week. Teams were spending hours maintaining channel consistency across extranets rather than focusing on revenue optimization and growth.
“We reached a point where distribution management was consuming too much operational time,” said Kévin Abaziou, Distribution Manager at Cocoonr. “It became clear that our distribution infrastructure needed to evolve if we wanted to continue scaling efficiently.”
From a strategic standpoint, Cocoonr faced a dual challenge: channel dependency and technological limitations. They knew demand existed from international European travelers, particularly German and Dutch guests, who are known for longer stays, higher spend, and earlier booking behavior, but accessing that demand through specialist channels wasn’t operationally viable without reliable, centralized connectivity.
The risk of overbooking, the manual content burden, and the missed international demand all pointed to the same conclusion: they needed a dedicated distribution partner.
The challenge wasn’t about saving time; it was about strategically unlocking new, high-value international demand to further optimize the performance of their growing portfolio.
The Solution
Cocoonr needed a better distribution layer that could solve the technical problems and connect them to different markets to capture travel demand. That’s what Rentals United delivered.
At the core, Rentals United replaced the fragmented iCal setup with a single, automated distribution layer connecting Cocoonr’s custom PMS to a broad ecosystem of OTAs and specialist channels. Calendars, pricing, and availability now sync instantly and reliably across all 4,500 listings.
And the impact of this decision went well beyond preventing overbookings. Rentals United fundamentally changed what channels Cocoonr could access, and on what terms they would list, depending on the owners preferences and the market’s demand.
The most strategically significant unlock was HomeToGo, a specialist platform purpose-built for reaching German and Benelux travelers: guests with strong purchasing power who book holiday homes for longer stays, further in advance. For a portfolio weighted toward coastal properties, countryside retreats, and larger homes, this was a high-value demographic that had been entirely out of reach.
Through Rentals United, adding HomeToGo required no bespoke integration work, no separate extranet management, and no additional operational overhead. The connection was rapid to set up, instantly reliable, and gave Cocoonr full control over payment processing and security deposits, removing the friction that had previously made specialist channels impractical to maintain at scale.
The impact of Rentals United modernized Cocoonr’s daily workflows. Previously, the Guest Relations team operated in a fragmented environment, juggling traveler communications across various OTA extranets and scattered Gmail inboxes.
Today, their communication system is integrated through Rentals United’s GuestPlanner, and HubSpot, so that Cocoonr can centralize all guest communications into a single interface.
“Today, Rentals United is much more than an additional layer in our tech stack,” said Abaziou. “It acts as the central distribution hub connecting our PMS and internal tools to a large ecosystem of OTAs and specialist channels. It has become a key component of how we scale distribution efficiently.”
The Results
The impact of integrating to Rentals United as a channel manager was substantial, successfully delivering the exact traveler demographic and booking behavior Cocoonr was targeting: connecting to HomeToGo.
By connecting to specialized platforms like Holidu and HomeToGo, Cocoonr successfully captured the exact high-purchasing-power demographics and booking behaviors they were targeting.
Since going live in August 2021, HomeToGo has generated 6,978 bookings, growing from zero to representing a steady 2% of the company’s massive total reservation volume. More importantly, the channel delivered exceptional value by driving a +30% Average Daily Rate (ADR) and significantly extending the booking window compared to other major OTAs.
| Channel | 2025 vs. 2024 |
| +24.5% | |
| HomeToGo | +9.4% |
| Airbnb | +6.6% |
| Booking.com | +4.8% |
This premium performance profile positively impacts Cocoonr’s revenue predictability and overall portfolio health.
The integration successfully shifted their guest demographic, ushering in a stronger share of international European travelers—particularly from Germany and the Netherlands—where previously French travelers had dominated their bookings. This heightened visibility has been especially beneficial for their larger properties, coastal homes, and countryside destinations.
When asked to describe the impact of the HomeToGo connection via Rentals United in three words, the Cocoonr team chose: Efficient, Reliable, and Complementary.
For other property managers looking to scale, Cocoonr’s advice is straightforward: fully leverage the operational simplicity of the Rentals United integration to access international demand without burdening your team with manual workloads or operational complexity.