Three-quarters of Australians planning a summer holiday will stay in their home state, says research from tourism, events and arts advisory consultancy MI Associates.
Just one in four of those who intend to travel are considering leaving their own state this holiday season and 25 per cent of the survey participants are still so concerned about COVID-19 that they won’t travel at all during the Christmas break.
The national survey of 2300 Australians, released by the Tourism and Transport Forum (TTF), shows that a quarter of those travelling this summer are choosing a road trip instead of flying and other modes and travel.
The study shows that the travel sector has a long way to go to instil confidence in encouraging flights and other modes of transport besides personal vehicles.
It may also have a lot of work to do to get people out of the home states and across borders.
While there was reluctance among respondents to fly, there was also reason for optimism, said TTF chief executive Margy Osmond, with regional areas nationally experiencing record bookings.
More than seven in 10 of those who previously planned overseas travel said they would instead spend all or part of their holiday budget domestically.
“Of those surveyed, 42.5 per cent said they would spend all of their travel budget locally with another 28 per cent indicating they would spend part,” said Ms Osmond.
“This is great news for domestic operators and shows there is significant opportunity to capture the outbound spend of locals who were going abroad, although it would still not fully compensate for the lack of international visitation.
“Anecdotal data from our airline members also shows bookings have ramped up since Queensland announced it would open its borders to Sydneysiders and Victorians on December 1 and with the South Australian/Victorian border reopening on the same date.
“Confidence, however, continues to be an issue but the low COVID case figures over the last couple of weeks, hopefully, will alleviate these concerns if they continue without another significant outbreak. The corporate travel market is also expected to take some time to recover as businesses remain reluctant to ask their staff to travel.”
Other findings of the survey include:
- 54 per cent of respondents favour a coastal summer holiday
- 62 per cent are travelling to support Australian tourism businesses
- 52 per cent of those planning to travel will be visiting family and friends
- 36 per cent of those surveyed are concerned about another outbreak of COVID-19.
Do you plan to get away this summer? Where are you headed?
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