#Trending This Week - Quietude, Luxury Travel Is More Expensive, Extended-Stay Hotels, Time Shares, And Cruising
Issue 186 • April 16, 2024
Now that the looming deadline of filing your taxes has passed — well, here in America anyway — it’s time to focus on what’s going on in the travel industry! Here is this week’s roundup of trends. We’ll start with QUIETUDE, the latest travel industry terminology. More and more people are finding the world is just getting way too noisy, so they are in search of destinations and experiences where quiet really is a priority (and we’re not talking sitting around a pool or on the beach). LUXURY TRAVEL is getting more expensive, but it doesn’t seem to be deterring high net worth consumers in the least. Whether it be the increased cost of labor, supply chain disruptions, inflation, or even the mindset that if people want really exclusive experiences, they are going to have to pay for them, the wealth of luxury travelers doesn’t seem to be a problem to accommodate the surging prices. EXTENDED-STAY HOTELS are a thriving segment of the hospitality industry with many leading hotel companies continuing to launch new extended-stay brands to meet the need. CRUISING has been getting a lot of media play lately with all of the recent hoopla surrounding the Icon of the Seas. After all, how large and how many of these behemoth ships can we have? Well apparently we haven’t yet reached the tipping point. A growing number of consumers are becoming first-time cruisers because they are understanding the perceived value of this mode of travel and also being influenced by friends and family to give it a try. And finally we’re talking TIME SHARES. Yeah, we all thought this was a dying segment, but believe it or not, younger generations have discovered time shares and they are loving the flexibility and afforability of the concept. Check it all out in our three-minute read below.
“Quietude” Is The Latest Travel Trend
There’s no denying it, the world is getting louder and it is getting increasingly more difficult to escape the noise. From serene nature retreats to silent walking, the quest for quietude has become one of modern travel’s latest trends. For many, quiet travel goes beyond escaping the cacophony of everyday life while on vacation. It can be a shift toward introspection, a deeper connection with where we are both literally and figuratively, and it is encapsulated in self-reflective tourism experiences like a dark retreat, a silent retreat, and even just getting lost. Read more in Fast Company here.
Luxury Travel Is Getting More Expensive
Wealthy travelers are fueling a surge in luxury travel experiences including hotels, trains, and more. According to a recent Virtuoso survey, average daily rates across the sector peaked this year and were 70% higher than in 2019. Exclusive luxury trips are only getting more expensive thanks to a spike in labor costs and ongoing supply chain disruptions caused by the pandemic — as well as the belief that people will pay more for truly exclusive opportunities. Travelers have traded up for more luxury experiences and the income and wealth levels, including accumulated savings, remain healthy for higher net wealth households. Read more in The Robb Report here.
Extended Stay Hotels Are The Darling Of The Industry
If there is one segment of the hospitality industry which is growing successfully, it is, without doubt, the extended stay market. With a huge push during COVID for people who chose to hunker down in places where they could cook and have extra space, as well as traveling medical and other essential workers who needed places to stay, and now with remote workers who want to work from places other than home, the extended-stay segment of hospitality is growing in leaps and bounds. Nearly all hotel companies are rushing to market with a new extended-stay brand. Read more in Hotel Management here.
Perceived Value Driving More People To Cruise
As the cruise industry continues to launch bigger and bigger ships, extensive research is being conducted on the first-time cruiser. The perceived value for money of cruising has significantly improved among prospective cruisers. In fact, 60% of the respondents said it was a past reason for not booking. These cruise newbies also reported friends and family as the most influential information sources (58%), while destination websites (34%), travel review websites (29%) and online travel agencies (29%) are surprisingly having the least impact on influencing them to book a cruise. Read more in Travel Agent here.
Time Shares Have Found A New Generation Of Owners
Just when you thought the era of the time share is over, think again. Millennials and Generation Z find the appeal of a timeshare is that their vacation is scheduled upfront and already paid for by the time they travel, not to mention that the product provides flexible options to travel more frequently and access a variety of destinations and unique experiences. In fact, according to ARDA, the trade association for the vacation ownership industry, the average timeshare owner today is 39 years old, and 57% of timeshare owners are either millennials or Gen Z. Read more in Skift here.