What’s your travel style? If you’re relatively new to the travel game you might not know. So try a few different approaches to see where you land.
Organized tours are popular. Typically, you book a travel company that will take care of everything. It books the flights, hotels, transportation and tour buses complete with a knowledgeable guide. All you have to do is get on the bus and sit back.
True, you’ll be on a bus with a lot of other people, but many travelers enjoy getting to know their fellow passengers and sometimes make lifelong friends.
Going it on your own appeals to a lot of other people. You pick your destination, book your own flights, figure out your own transportation and either get hotel rooms or reserve a condo or home through services like Airbnb or VRBO.
Diane Pyne, cruise and leisure manager for World Travel Service in Knoxville, has been booking trips for 25 years and she has seen a real increase in the number of travelers this year who want everything taken care of for them.
“My escorted trips have really picked up,” she says. “They want someone to look after them. A lot of it has to do with the comfort of someone with them. When COVID happened and the U.S. closed its borders, I had customers who were in Europe and it was quite a feat to get them back into this country.”
“People saw the travel agent value of people who could step in and get it done. When I travel I generally want to see 100 places in a week. I want someone who knows the destination and can show me what I want to see.”
Caryn Hatcher, an agent with Key To The World Travel in Nolensville, has customers who want the opposite. “It’s the alternative to being herded from place to place,” she says. “I’m seeing people wanting to go to one place and live for a while.”
Living like a local is one way to gain that experience. Instead of hopping from destination to destination, travelers pick a spot and stay there so they become, at least temporarily, immersed in the culture. They may find a local cafe and frequent it on a daily basis or find a grocery store where they can buy local products and, if they’re renting their own accommodations, cook with them.
A survey by GetYourGuide found 90% of respondents want to experience a destination “like a local,” and two-thirds of millennial respondents specifically are concerned that their vacation is an authentic experience.
And then there’s “hush travel” or digital nomadism, potentially the newest travel trend of 2023. With the increase of remote work, travelers have discovered that if you work by computer and have an internet connection, you can do business from anywhere. No need to even tell your boss.
Some rentals offer discounts or extended stays and offer other perks like fitness centers and pools. Or how about a tropical beach?
“People going somewhere for three weeks bring their laptop and work remotely,” says Hatcher. “If you can work remotely, why not work in Cancun? You don’t say you’re in Cancun, but you’re wearing sandals while you’re on your laptop.”
And, finally, there’s the comfort factor. Some people choose to travel as economically as possible. They’ll put up with economy class seats on a nine-hour flight to Europe or more affordable accommodations on one trip so they can take that savings and apply it to another.
But the pandemic has changed some of that thinking.
“I’ve found in the last six months people are spending more for comfort, meaning going to Germany or Switzerland where they would fly the least expensive they can,” Pyne says. “Now they’re flying premium economy. Now they’re flying business class. People are saying ‘I’m worth being comfortable.’”