Ten Travel Trends Will Have a Major Impact on Luxury Vacation Rentals in 2007
Jan. 16, 2007. Peter Yesawich identifies ten major travel trends for 2007 in an article published in Smith Travel Research. These trends will have a major impact on luxury vacation rentals. Here are Yesawich’s predictions:
1. Demand for leisure travel services will continue to outpace that for business travel services.
2. Family travel (adults with children) will continue to grow at a faster rate than all other forms of leisure travel.
3. Practically all travel suppliers will attempt to raise fares and/or rates, as demand for travel services continues to grow, capacity becomes more strained, and operating costs escalate.
4. The role of the Internet will continue to dominate the travel-planning/booking headlines, yet the incidence of Internet usage by both business and leisure travelers to plan some aspect of travel will remain flat, while the incidence of its usage to actually book reservations will continue to grow but at a significantly lower rate.
5. Comparison shopping of suppliers’ fares and rates (and the corresponding “price transparency�) will become more commonplace.
6. The new “lifestyle� hotel brands such as NYLO, ALOFT, etc. will continue to gain both exposure and popularity among the next generation of travelers.
7. The concept of “inclusive pricing� will grow in popularity beyond destination resorts to include commercial hotels seeking to provide road warriors with good value for “just the basics� (a comfortable bed, a good working desk, breakfast, High Speed Internet access, and reward points).
8. Interest in spa-going will continue to grow as more consumers seek ways to manage the mounting stress in their lives.
9. The cruise industry will continue to enjoy remarkable growth, thereby becoming an even more formidable competitor of destination (land-based) hotels and resorts.
10. The new .travel Internet domain will continue to grow in popularity.
Yesawich concludes with the prediction that, “Most importantly, barring the impact of any catastrophic political, economic, social or terrorist event in the months ahead, 2007 should be another year for the record books.�
We at VacationRental.org agree that many of these trends will have a major impact on the travel industry in 2007 and beyond. We help our members cope with them both in our daily blogs and in our Vacation Rentals Newsletter.
