Britons Defy The Recession To Enjoy Their Holidays
The recession has hit the travel industry hard. This has been seen with the big amount of job losses in the sector, and even with the collapse of several airlines. The pattern has been repeated crossways Europe and there have been fears among industry analysts that the economic downturn will place people off their holidays altogether.
Fortunately it appears that, despite the straitened circumstances, UK citizens are not prepared to forgo their holidays. A significant amount of research and industry feedback has indicated that British travellers are altering their holiday habits, rather than cancel the holidays themselves.
At the close of 2009, leading travel companies Thomson and First Choice revealed that online polling had found that a big 80 per cent of people were committed to their holidays and were planning to book their break – or breaks – as normal during 2010. The same number of respondents stated that they were refusing to let the economic downturn modify their holiday plans.
The encouraging results were part of the 2009 Thomson and First Choice annual trends report, which also revealed that almost half of all respondents would not be slicing the budgets for their holidays and 24 per cent stated that they planned to spend more. Nevertheless, the recession was not without impact, as the survey revealed that many people are changing the way that they view their holidays.
Thomson and First Choice found that 6 per cent of respondents who had changed their holiday plans last year had booked a package holiday to ensure that they were covered by ATOL’s viands in the event of their company going bust. At least they would get flown home, went the logic. This concern has remained, with 13 per cent admitting to making the same arrangement for their holidays this year.
Another way that UK holiday habits have changed in the grappling of the recession – alongside the growth of world wide web technology – is that the way in which many people book their holidays has changed. There has been a substantial increase in the number of holidays which are booked on the World wide web using price comparison websites and the sites of smaller, independent holiday companies.
Holidaymakers don’t only do this to save money. The growth of tailor-made holidays booked at home is also in part due to the increased confidence that consumers feel about taking matters into their own hands and getting onto the Internet.
Kim has 4 years experience in the travel industry. She enjoys writing articles on various destinations and
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Thomson television ad – first aired 17 December 2009. Let us know what you think?
Video Rating: 4 / 5
