There’s no denying that travel is constantly changing, not only in terms of destinations most people tend to visit, but also the way we experience things.
Especially since the post-COVID era, things are evolving faster than ever; think of how many people travel to work remotely as digital nomads for example.
Here at Stasher, having been in the epicenter of the travel space since 2015, we ran a survey to see how travel preferences have changed recently, and specifically:
- What people prioritise when traveling
- How much remote work has evolved
- Preferred means of transportation
- Views on solo travel
And many more!
TL;DR
Let’s have a look at a brief overview of some of our findings, before we dive deeper.
1) Demographics
Starting off with the demographics of our survey’s respondents, it’s worth noting that a little over half of them (55.6%) identify as male while 42.2% identify as female.
With 2.2% identifying as “other”.
In terms of age, the majority of respondents (64.4%) fall in the 26-35 age group followed by 15.6% in the 19-25 group, with the other groups constituting small equal percentages.
2) Travel Priorities
Now that we got to know the profile of our respondents a little better, it’s time to dive deeper into their views and opinion on traveling.
When it comes to what they prioritise when traveling:
- 35.8% opt for adventure
- 33.4% opt for relaxation
- 28.7% prefer culture
While only a small percentage of respondents consider themselves a party animal so they prioritise nightlife (think of summers in Ibiza and Mykonos 🕺).
3) How COVID-19 impacted traveling
Since we’re examining how travel preferences have evolved recently, the pandemic of COVID-19 couldn’t be missing from our survey, considering it was a global event of extreme impact, especially for the travel industry.
For instance, more than half of our respondents (53.3%) answered that they have worked remotely in another country over the last 3 years.
However, what’s interesting is that a staggering 91.1% had never worked remotely abroad before the pandemic!
Which undoubtedly shows the impact the pandemic had in remote work.
Apart from traveling for work reasons, travel preferences after the pandemic have changed for holidays as well.
To give you an idea, 40% of our respondents answered that they now take 1-2 annual holidays more than before the pandemic, with 13.3% taking more than 3.
On the other hand, 37.8% haven’t changed their travel frequency and only a small percentage take less holidays.
4) Means of transportation
When we ask how people usually travel for their holidays, things we’re pretty straightforward since:
- 83.2% tend to travel by plane ✈️
- 9% usually opt for trains 🚆
- 6.8% prefers traveling by car 🚗
And only a very small percentage travels by ship 🚢
5) Staycations
On the topic of staycations, we don’t notice a significant change in preferences, since people are almost 50-50 when asked if they take more staycations now compared to their childhood.
6) Solo travel
When it comes to solo travel, about 75% of our survey’s respondents said that they would consider traveling solo.
However, those who answered “No” explain their reasons. Notably, here are some of the most common reasons:
- Well because I have social anxiety and being a woman alone in a foreign country wouldn’t make me feel safe
- Danger
- Family
- Cause i always travel with my partners
- Prefer to have company
As well as: “wife and kids innit”
7) Package holidays vs own itinerary
When people were asked whether they prefer to book package holidays or choose their own itinerary, the answer was clear.
Almost 89% of them prefer to create their own itinerary, rather than booking package holidays.
This comes as no surprise since nowadays people want more flexibility and independence with their travels.
After all, with so many travel services available you can do everything on your own, such as finding a secure place to store your luggage with the help of Stasher (shameless plug).
8) Travel and budgeting
Money is a vital part of traveling, since it impacts where you can go, how long you’ll stay, what you’ll do and many other things.
This is why we asked our respondents what kind of travelers they believe to be, when it comes to budgeting.
This is how they answered:
- Average traveler (64.5%)
- Budget traveler (24.4%)
- Big spender (11.1%)
However, what’s more interesting is the fact that people now spend more money on their holidays than what they used to 5 years ago.
To be precise:
- 46.2% spend significantly more than what they used to
- 41.8% spend somewhat more
- 8.8% spend about the same amount of money
While only about 3% of people now spend less money while traveling.
Interesting, right?
9) Worst holiday destination
The pandemic, money etc are all serious topics so we wanted to get the opinion of our respondents on something slightly different, which is the worst place/country they’ve ever visited and why.
There was a great variety of answers, so below we’ve listed just some of them:
- Vienna, beautiful but felt quite sterile and didn’t have too much character
- Antwerp, I had a really bad experience there
- Singapore, a country that doesn’t have much to offer other than shopping.
- Kerala, India. Too adventurous, not for me.
- Slovakia – just nothing special to me
- Preveza
- London – far too crowded and expensive
- Wales – wet and windy.
- Paris, because of relatively rude people
- Delhi – air pollution and noise
- Doha
- Ho Chi Minh. There are definitely better places to be when traveling Vietnam.
The most interesting answer was probably “Ant’s bedroom”… but who are we to judge, right?
10) Luggage storage facilities
Last but not least, we asked people whether they’ve ever used luggage storage facilities while traveling, with almost 69% saying “Yes”.
If you’re one of those who replied with “No”, why not have a closer look at Stasher?
You can safely store your bags in just a couple of minutes, so you can enjoy your travels luggage-free!
And that sums up our travel preferences survey.
From our findings quite a few things are clear, such as the fact that the pandemic of COVID-19 has indeed impacted how we travel, as well as the fact that we’re now willing to spend more money on our holidays than ever before!
