Tourism after the coronavirus: will the traditional two-week summer vacation turn into weekend tours?

As part of ongoing measures to combat the coronavirus pandemic, airlines and travel companies have suspended flights, canceled package tours, and sent staff home.

Up to 1 million Russian tourists have already bought tours for the upcoming summer on early booking promotions: not all of them want to take the money back, but are looking forward to the opening of borders to finally take a break from forced self-isolation.

According to a study by Luggage Hero (USA), the demand for travel after the end of the pandemic will be greater than before the appearance of the virus. But at first the demand will have a different structure than we used to because of the caution of tourists:

Travelers will prefer local travel outside the city.

International tourism will become unpopular for the time being, as people will choose not to travel far from home for safety reasons.

Tourists will prefer short trips to save on the background of the general recession of the economy: a two-week vacation will turn into weekend tours.

At the same time, experts agree that tourism is a highly elastic industry that is quickly recovering from various excesses. For example, the rather rapid recovery of tourism after the terrorist attack on New York on September 11, 2001 (9/11).

Most likely, once the pandemic comes to an end, the surviving tour operators will launch aggressive advertising to seize market share left over from the bankrupt companies. Similarly, countries will try to distribute in their favor the global tourist flow from countries that have been badly affected by the pandemic.

Experts believe that the coronavirus will almost certainly cause the bankruptcy of well-known travel brands, and will be able to survive the pandemic fewer players in the tourism and transport markets. The consequences of the coronavirus can be compared with the invasion of aliens.

Source: tourprom