Aito businesses raised concerns about trading prior to conflict

An Aito Business Confidence Tracker last month showed travel firms were already concerned about the impact of global and economy uncertainty even before the outbreak of a conflict between the US and Israel and Iran. 

 

In February, 81% of operators in The Specialist Travel Association (Aito) said they were concerned about global, political and economic stability.

 

The same number (81%) said they thought this would adversely affect their business in the next 12 months.

 

More than a third (32%) of operators also told the tracker that January was not as good this year as last year while 60% said pay-per-click Google advertising was performing ‘worse or much worse’ than this time last year.

 

The figures from last month’s business tracker were revealed at the launch of the Aito Insights Report 2026 by customer data and insights company Spike, based on the responses of 8,500 clients of 20 specialist travel operators, travel agents and tourist boards in December 2025.

 

The survey showed the number of Aito customers intending to take more holidays this year has risen but by less than last year, with more holidaymakers planning the same number of trips.

 

The report asked holidaymakers if they planned to take more, less or the same number of holidays this year as last year.

 

In total, 20% said they would take more holidays, compared with 28% last year; 68% said they would take the same amount of holidays, higher last year’s figure of 61% last year; but 12% said they would take fewer, the same figure as last year.

 

The number planning to take more holidays in 2026 than they took in 2025 represented a net increase of 8%. Last year’s net increase was 16%. The figure is reached by subtracting the number of respondents who want to travel less from the number who want to travel more.

 

Spike director Roy Barker said: “This year we have ended up with a net increase of 8%.

 

“This is a lot like looking at inflation figures. If last year was a good year, which for many it was, that figure is already baked into what people are saying.

 

“The movement is towards people taking the same amount of holidays rather than taking less.”

 

In terms of where they planned to go, 45% said at the time of the survey that they would take two or more European holidays and 25% said they would take two or more holidays outside Europe.

 

Barker also noted a “spring peak”, with more respondents saying they would book in their 2026 holidays in spring than in January or February, suggesting “traditional booking patterns may be less rigid than they were” and said the survey showed “resistance to AI” in the booking process among Aito customers.

 

He encouraged Aito companies to exploit an obvious gap between customers’ active willingness to recommend them (80%) and the business actually coming from direct recommendations (16%).

 

“Growth is available. That gap between people’s willingness to recommend and actually do it is an opportunity that could be exploited,” he said.

 

Similarly, he added that while 70% of clients said they would book again, in reality the figure would be much less, and said encouraging more repeat bookers could reap its rewards.

 

“You can encourage them to book again. In our analysis of the specialist market most people only book once. We feel there is an opportunity to extract more value,” he said, adding that in the current climate of “perceived risk” the value of Aito companies’ expertise rises.