Thứ Hai, 30 tháng 6, 2014

Travel and accommodation: what you need to know

There has been a rise in holiday intention, which is now at a five-year high. Image: Thinkstock


The tourism sector contributed $42.3 billion to the Australian economy in the year 2012-13, that’s an increase of 3.7 percent, according to Tourism Research Australia. And total visitor expenditure of $98.7 billion was up 3.4 percent. So if you want to join the travel trade where should you invest? Check out these trends and statistics.



Jane Ianniello, international director of tourism, travel leisure, Roy Morgan Research, says “After declining dramatically early last year, holiday intention has recovered and is now at a five-year high, for both domestic and overseas holidays. This is particularly good news for the Australian tourism industry, which saw domestic intention hit a five-year low this time last year.    



“Intriguingly, there have been no significant year-on-year increases in Australians’ overall sense of financial security or optimism about the future, or even in consumer confidence levels. Furthermore, there isn’t a specific age bracket or demographic group driving the rise in holiday intention — it appears to be a fairly general trend.” 



However finding accommodation is going to be an issue, suggests Euromonitor senior research analyst Daniel Grimsey. “One concern is where are we going to put people? With the dollar down there is an increase in Asian visitors – tourists from Malaysia and Singapore saw double digit growth last year. 



“Arrivals overall grew by only five percent – but this is still quite good and the strongest growth in arrivals we’ve had since the GFC.  



“There’s a bit of growth in budget hotels. If you fly in on a budget airline, you need to stay in budget accommodation.” 



For the business market the end of the mining boom and the cuts to government travel over the last two years have had an impact, says Grimsey. 



MARKET DISRUPTERS



  • home-owner accommodation website Airbnb


  • a gamification element to online bookings: Sydney based software company Wynbox has doubled the number of room bookings for Rydges, according to BRW, with a focus on the lowest available room rate and a one in five chance for customers who book to get their room for free.


IN HOLIDAY MODE



1. Taking a greycation



Baby boomers are travelling and there will be more demand for family accommodation over the next 10 years. While the number of caravan parks is declining the value of the sector is going gangbusters: for instance, Big4 has migrated from being a caravan park to a holiday park network with resort facilities. 



2. Holiday on a shoestring 



New to the franchise arena in Australia is Tune hotels, a global budget hotel business focused on providing extras on a user-pays basis and owned by low-cost fares airline AirAsia.



FRANCHISE PLAYERS



Who is playing in the franchise sector? Some of the brands operating a franchise network are:



Accor  

Big4 

Choice Hotels 

Escape Travel 

Evergreen Holidays 

Flight Centre 

Harvey World Travel 

Jetset Travel 

Intercontinental 

Mantra 

MTA Travel 

Quest Serviced Accommodation 

Tune



Travel and accommodation: what you need to know

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