The Airbnb Story: How Three Guys Disrupted an Industry, Made Billions of Dollars … and Plenty of Enemies

by (Journalist) Leigh Gallagher

historical figures like General George S. Patton, former secretary of defense Robert McNamara, and scores of others; management tomes by the dozens (his favorite is Andy Grove’s High Output Management); and niche-industry sources like the Cornell Hospitality Quarterly. To say Chesky is a voracious reader doesn’t quite capture it. He takes his family on vacation once a year, usually around the holidays, when his way of recharging is to ingest as many books as possible. While he’s away, “he doesn’t stop reading,” says his mother, Deb Chesky. “We’re at dinner, and he’s reading.” He also spends the holidays drafting his annual letter to employees, “for hours and days, like, nonstop,” Deb says. “And he reads it to us, and we think it’s perfect, and then he’s gone and changed it fifty times.”