This year, the proportion of domestic travel for summer vacation increased, while the proportion of overseas travel decreased. The trend - overseas travel increase & domestic travel decrease - changed for the first time in three years. The trend of visiting nearby entertainment facilities rather than the nature of faraway places remained, and hotels became the top accommodation by surpassing pension in terms of the number of room bookings. It seems the tendency is changing to domestic-nearby-hotel structure for traveling.
Travel research specialized firm, ConsumerInsight asked a total of 25,724 adults about how and where they spent the summer vacation in and out of country during the last June and August. Among them, 8 out of 10 people (78.8%) traveled for at least 1 night and 2 days, which was 2.1% points(P) up against 76.7% last year.
■ Domestic travel increased by 4.7%P, Overseas travel decreased by 1.7%P
For people who have experience in traveling for 1 night or over, 70.5% went to domestic travel, while 24.8% went to overseas travel, and the people who had been doing both domestic and overseas were 16.5% [Figure 1]. Domestic travel had increased by 4.2%P against last year but overseas travel had decreased by 1.7%P, while who went both domestic and overseas had increased by 0.4%P. In particular, females in their 20s had a large increase rate for domestic travel. The phenomenon of increase in domestic travel and the decrease in overseas travel was the first reversal of trend in the recent 3 years.
■ Dispersion of traveling demand from the end of July to the beginning of August
Less traveling from the end of July to the beginning of August caused a change in `the peak traveling season`. The rate of traveling during the end of Jul. to the beginning of Aug. in 2016 was 51.4% which was more than half, but this year the rate had decreased by 11.7%P to 39.7% within 3 years during the same period. On the other hand, traveling had increased during the week with holidays such as Memorial Day (Jun. 6th) and National Liberation Day (Aug. 15th). It can be seen that people are avoiding peak seasons by using their annual leaves for the long weekends.
■ Domestic rather than Japan… Big demand in `Hotel` due to `Ho-cance` proliferation
The reason for the increase of domestic traveling for a summer vacation in three years was that ① the demand to travel to Japan has converted to domestic traveling due to Korea-Japan trade war and the boycott movement of Japanese product/travel, and ② the large influx of Ho-cance (A compound word of Hotel + Vacance).
The actual data of accommodation show that the Hotel was the highest at 27.3%, surpassing Pension (23.9%) for the first time. This is a 10.3%P increase from 17.0% in 2016, proving to be `the trend` while continuing the uptrend for three consecutive years.
■ "Summer vacation market, dynamically changing"
The summer vacation market is rapidly changing. △Domestic travel increase △Avoiding peak season △Hotel rather than pension △Closer destinations △Preferring Resting/entertainment to sightsee etc. were the keywords for the change. People are now seeing summer vacation as part of their regular leisure life rather than an important annual event, showing a positive change in the congestion and overcharged prices caused by peak seasons. It is very important to see that the travel industry is showing advancement in its traveling culture, which values the actual traveling and recharging rather than consumptive and showy travel behavior.
[Figure1] Summer vacation travel experience rate (%)
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