Travel with Katie Butler: Bookings and confidence in travel are strong

Katie Butler, Total Travel, writes: It is a great insight into what customers have been booking and what they intend to book in the future, and helps us plan our marketing activity.

In the past 12 months, the travel industry has continued its recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic against a backdrop of an ongoing rise in the cost of living.

High energy bills, increased mortgage and rent payments, and an uplift in day-to-day costs – such as food and transport are among the price rises that have been putting a strain on household budgets.

The industry has also experienced a number of natural, man-made and technological challenges – from wildfires to strikes and an unprecedented air traffic control outage.

Despite this, bookings and confidence in travel are strong.

Overall, 84 per cent of people went on holiday during the last year and 52 per cent took a trip abroad.

Of those who took a foreign trip, 61 per cent went on a package holiday – the main market for many of the businesses in ABTA membership.

This appetite for travel looks set to continue into next year, with 64 per cent of people saying they plan to take a trip overseas.

The research also found a growing number of holidaymakers are booking their holiday through a travel agent and our growth over the last two years certainly backs up this research.

The report is based on research with a nationally representative sample of 2,000 people and was carried out in the last two weeks of August 2023.

It looks at people’s holiday habits in the 12 months prior to that summer and what their travel plans are for the year ahead.

The full report makes an interesting read and is available for everyone to see on the ABTA website: www.abta.com.

It is less than 60 sleeps to Christmas… once again we are delighted to announce that we will be working alongside Mission Christmas Cash For Kids, Pulse 1 and Greatest Hits Radio.

Both our stores in Heckmondwike and Ossett will be official nominated drop-off points for this cause.

We are collecting unwrapped toys and gifts for local children that for one reason or another will not be receiving Christmas presents this year.

If you would like to help us with our mission – please drop any donations in store on or before December 16, to give us time to deliver to the Cash For Kids warehouse.

Unlike many, the families and children supported by this mission cannot reduce their outgoings, reduce food bills or cancel holidays, because they have never had these luxuries to begin with.

We absolutely love doing this to help local children and this year having two drop-off points we are hoping to make it our biggest collection yet.

We continue to be taking a consistent amount of late bookings, which ordinarily starts to slow down at this time of year.

In fact a huge 23 per cent of our total bookings taken last week were to travel next month, with Tenerife and Cyprus taking top spot.

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