Article
Travel Weekly Insight Annual Report 2018
Analysis of the UK travel market
The outbound holiday market from the UK remains extraordinarily resilient, having defied all forecasts of a downturn since the referendum vote to leave the EU in June 2016.
We are proud once again to produce the Travel Weekly Insight Annual Report 2018, in association with Travel Weekly. In this report we provide our perspectives and views of the UK travel market within the context of the global economic and political landscape.
Overview
Despite rising concerns about Brexit, the UK travel sector has performed well in 2018. Consumers continue to prioritise their holiday spending and remain confident about travelling amid other world events
Key findings
- Powerhouses for leisure travel are the
middle aged travellers but also consumers in the South
- Consumers have felt some pressure on discretionary income, particularly in the first half of 2018. Consumers are looking for ways to reduce the cost of the initial outlay, resulting in fluctuation in leisure spending from quarter to quarter. There is a greater focus on all-inclusive which shows consumers are focused on getting value.
- Smartphones continue to gain popularity as an accessible booking tool – driven by smartphone size in recent years becoming a bit bigger and internet connections improving on mobile
- Terrorism related response from the sector has worked and in the absence of recent
attacks consumers report lower levels of concern. However, the sector needs to do more to address resort sickness issues, and also become vigilant in monitoring and documenting compliance to avoid issues with fraudulent claims
- Brexit is a concern with 3 in 5 people wary of it, but it does not yet appear to have halted or
dampen consumers’ intentions to travel in 2019