Could 2022 be bigger than 2019 when it comes to travel? After three
years of being plagued by Covid-19 travel restrictions and postponed
trips, people are ready for a vacation. The pandemic has, however,
transformed the way people think about travel, what they expect on
vacation and how they choose and arrive in their destination. These
factors are reshaping travel trends in the coming year.
1. Younger travellers looking to go exotic
Younger travellers are not looking for just a simple trip to the
beach to get away. They want an immersive adventure. If they are going
to the beach, it's likely exotic such as the Maldives and other off-beat
tropical destinations. According to Contiki, their younger travellers
are looking to go far and wide to places like Thailand, Ireland, Egypt
and South Africa.
2. Trips of a lifetime
As many predicted, now that travel is opening up, people are ready to
book their bucket list vacations. Covid-19 illuminated the fact that
there might not always be time to take the trip of a lifetime so they
are taking them now. In 2022, expect to see many people booking trips of
a lifetime, whether that is an extended world cruise, an African safari
or a long-awaited bucket list adventure like a trek to Machu Picchu, a
trip to the Galapagos or climbing Kilimanjaro.
3. Ecotourism and sustainable travel
Travellers have become more aware of how transportation and
overtourism were harming the destinations they love so much. They also
recognised how undertourism and the lack of travel similarly harmed
popular places. Travellers are beginning to square these two problems
and are looking for sustainable ways to travel that allow them to
experience the world while helping preserve global destinations.
A
recent Amadeus-commissioned survey found that two-thirds of consumers
consider sustainable travel a priority, and 37 percent of respondents
think opportunities for travellers to be involved in the preservation of
tourist destinations will help the industry to become more sustainable
in the long term.
4. Bring your friends
Not only have people not been able to travel, but they haven't been
able to see their friends the way they used to. Travelers are going to
be hitting the road in 2022, and they are not going alone.
5. Travel research
Travel during a pandemic is never easy, and research from Google has
found that people are spending a lot more time gathering information on
places they want to go these days. What are they looking for?
Information on what to do, where to go while they are in a destination,
where to eat, Covid-protocols and more.
6. Travel advisors
It's never been more complicated to book and plan a vacation than
right now. Pandemic-weary travellers may be researching travel and the
destinations that they are going to, but they don't want to figure out
all the hurdles of getting there. Travel advisors have never been more
important and more sought after than they are now.
7. The value of travel increases
After more than a year of not being able to travel, people are
appreciating that they can once again. Travelers are willing to jump
through a number of hoops such as vaccine passports and Covid-19 testing
to continue to exercise what they view as almost a right to travel.
8. The future is here
Technology has made big leaps during the pandemic. In many ways,
companies did take advantage of the pause to refocus their efforts and
recognised the opportunity to reset. For the consumer, travel tech has
never been more important in the no-contact environment the pandemic has
created. New contactless services such as mobile check-in for air
travel, hotels and rental cars were here before the pandemic, but now
they have been even more widely adopted by travellers. Companies
continue to improve and streamline in these areas.
However,
there are even bigger moves being made in the industry. Virgin
Hyperloop is aiming to streamline how travellers get from one city to
the next, reducing travel time. Airlines are working on more sustainable
fuels and building supersonic airliners, and people are traveling to
space.
Source: TravelPulse