Over the past few weeks, the news has been filled with survey after survey about the travel industry in a post-COVID world. Will the cruise lines survive? Will people want to travel? Should we have bailed out the airlines? The list goes on. But with every survey, there is an inherent bias based on your audience and I wonder what the real truth is.
- Value Penguin says that 47% of the people have cancelled their summer travel plans.
- Mower says that 28% of the people plan to travel this year, but of them, 84% plan to do it by car.
- Overseas Leisure Group says that 72% of the people are making plans to travel with 35% planning to travel this summer—with 76% by plane.
- MMGY says that 59% of the people are ready to travel now and that cruise bookings are only down 1% over last year.
- Royal Caribbean has said that 2021 bookings are within historical ranges to the 2019 bookings.
- Cruise Planners has said that cruise bookings shot up 600% over the same day in 2019 when Carnival announced they would resume sailings on May 4th. (Monday this year, Saturday last year).
So, what does it all mean? There are certainly no trends there. Mower says that 28% of the people are raring to go and OLG says it’s 72%. Margin of error of 44%?
Personally, my client base of single parents and their kids is freaked out and according to the Frenaye Poll, 100% will not be traveling anytime soon. I have heard from others that bookings are starting to come back. A cruise pundit stated that bookings were through the roof, and then had to back off when those bookings were not new ones, but certificates issued by the cruise lines for canceled cruises.
So it is all over. I am not sure if it is a regional thing, an age thing, a travel type thing, or something else. Interested in a quick poll? Take 2 minutes, answer a few questions and we’ll dig into the results in a few weeks. And in case the survey does not appear below…here’s a link!
Create your own user feedback survey
Until then… be safe, hang in there; and oh yeah–wash your hands, stop touching your face, and remain socially distant!
