Jim Byers' Blog: U.S. Travel Interest is Rising Rapidly; Canada Has Some Good Signs, Too

Jim Byers’ Blog: U.S. Travel Interest is Rising Rapidly; Canada Has Some Good Signs, Too

February 13, 2021 Jim Byers

The first story was interesting. The second made me think. But today I spotted yet another story about how consumer confidence in travel is running fairly solid in the United States.

We here in Canada seem to be stuck in slow motion. Some of our provinces are improving their virus numbers, but our vaccines are dripping out slowly. It’s like we’ve tapped into a maple tree in the forest a month too early and can’t figure out why there’s no sweet sap in our bucket.

It’s understandable that we look at the world through our own northern lens and get alarmed by spikes in Newfoundland or other parts of the country. But there’s a report today from NBC.com that makes it look like we’re getting closer to better days.

“As the pace of Covid-19 vaccinations is ramping up in the U.S., so is consumer confidence — and with it, a surge in travel bookings for later this year and for 2022,” the NBC report said.

“Many travellers are feeling optimistic that they will be able to vacation abroad this year. Many people are already actively planning their next big trip — even for trips more than four months out,” said Shibani Walia, senior research analyst at Tripadvisor.

How about that? Yes, there could be more problems later with variants. But the fact is that our neighbors to the south are feeling pretty good about the state of travel right now. The head of Delta Air Lines this week said he hasn’t seen a surge in bookings, but that there’s a decided increase in searches taking place, and that’s the first step.

I suspect that Canadians might feel a lot better come mid-March or early April when more shirts and blouses are being rolled up at the clinic and more daffodils and tulips are shooting up in our gardens.

There’s also been some positive news on the domestic front. In case you missed it, Flair Airlines this week said they’ll begin launch an ambitious flight network in Canada starting May 1, with flights in and out of destinations such as Ottawa, Charlottetown, Edmonton, Halifax, Abbotsford, Kitchener-Waterloo and Saint John.

In a story posted on the CBC website, Charlottetown Airport CEO Doug Newson said the Flair announcement might be the first step in a travel/tourism recovery for Prince Edward Island.

“Any positive news is good,” he said. “And it’s a bit of a sign that hopefully we are starting to rebuild and starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel.”

A report on the Consumer Affairs website this week said that TripAdvisor experts recently analyzed first-party search data and coupled that with traveler sentiment across six major travel markets — the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Italy, Japan, and Singapore.

“They found that consumer confidence toward international travel — particularly in the second half of 2021 — is a key trend and is already showing up in the majority of hotel clicks on its platform.”

The NBC News story said that a recent Tripadvisor survey found that 80 per cent of U.S. consumers planned to take at least one overnight domestic leisure trip in 2021, with just over one-third of respondents planning at least three domestic trips this year.

“Popular destinations such as Orlando are already seeing a hopeful booking rebound,” their report said.

I’m not saying it’s all rosebuds and Valentines (well, it is on Sunday), but there are clearly some good things happening in the travel industry right now. And that’s something to feel good about on a cold February day in Canada.