Skift Take
Current U.S. travel information includes signs of optimism for 2022.
Sean O’Neill
Data from a couple of travel innovation vendors highlight the headwind for healing created by the omicron variation.
Omicron knocked U.S. travel, but December didn’t witness the very same crash in domestic reservations for leisure travel that the U.S. saw when the delta variation initially emerged. The information, while not surprising, holds a couple of nuanced lessons for travel marketers.
December’s results marked a month-over-month decline compared to November 2021, with sales dropping 30 percent, traveler journeys down 21 percent, and U.S. domestic trips down 20 percent. The chart below paints this photo by utilizing flight information from U.S. travel agencies going through ARC (Airlines Reporting Corporation), an airline-owned tech service.
“The end-of-year decline we usually see in sales and journeys was more pronounced this year with customers stressed over the omicron variant,” said Steve Solomon, vice president of international sales, marketing, operations, and consumer experience at ARC.
The lesson for travel companies is that they require to use ongoing versatility for rebookings in 2022, a point echoed in current hotel reports about omicron lastly hitting hotel reservations.
“While not surprising, the nuance is that searches and reservations are still typical– people are simply canceling more frequently at the last minute depending upon the spread of omicron,” comments Scott Thornburg, a spokesperson at Sojern, an advertising technology vendor for the travel sector.
However travel companies also require to tailor their marketing message to an audience that appears prepared to excited to return taking a trip once again.
Throughout the winter season vacations, omicron appeared to trigger lots of Americans to hold back on taking a trip altogether because of the safety issue of going to family during the omicron surge. They didn’t switch to staycations, Thornburg stated.
Plus, tourists show a willingness to pay to fly. The average U.S. round-trip ticket in December 2021 was $460, down only 4 percent from pre-pandemic December 2019, ARC reported.
ARC pulled the information from 10,783 U.S. retail and business travel bureau areas and onlinetravel firms. Outcomes do not consist of sales of tickets purchased straight from airline companies.
Concerning vaccination requirements on airline companies, many Americans aren’t fussed. An early January survey of 3,000 tourists by Cardify, a consumer data insights company, discovered that just 44 percent of participants would choose an airline with a vaccine requirement.
On the other hand, 21 percent stated they would choose an airline particularly without a vaccine requirement, and 33 percent stated vaccine requirements didn’t matter.
For the worldwide photo, see Skift Research’s latest Travel Tracker Report for December 20221: Americans Traveling Abroad Strikes a Pandemic High.
Overall, the leisure travel story is brighter than the business travel one.
Simply 54 percent of companies surveyed by Deloitte, the advisory company, believe they will reach their pre-crisis company travel spending levels by the end of 2022. That’s problematic for full-service hotels and network airline groups, which depend upon high-margin corporate travel for their profitability. To assist fill the gap, brand names may stress luxury leisure travel and remote working choices. For context, see Skift Megatrends 2022.