The UK travel market is not going to see a repeat of last year’s late, late bookings show, according to Kuoni.
Joanna Edmunds, the luxury operator’s UK managing director, said people last year were forced into booking breaks late during the recession due to job uncertainty and against their natural inclination.
However, Kuoni research found that 52% of consumers prefer to book early because it gives them more time to look forward to a break, while a further 51% said it gave them more time to plan their holiday.
Edmunds said she believed that with the job market now more settled and signs of the economy improving, more consumers would revert to booking earlier so they could enjoy looking forward to their breaks.
“People’s habits have been changing during the recession,” she said. “This year there may still be a lot of people booking at the last minute, and they may get a good deal, but they will miss out on the anticipation – and that is important.”
Edmunds said Kuoni was also seeing renewed growth in multi-centre experiential holidays, demand for which fell last year as consumers, worn out by the recession, opted for more relaxing fly-and-flop breaks.
She said: “What people were tending to do [before the recession] was to take the classic beach break with another element thrown in. For instance, if they were in Thailand they would visit Bangkok, but during the recession they would just go direct to the beach.”
However, Edmunds said there were signs consumers were again prepared to book an experiential break, with India, Vietnam and South America proving popular.