Delta Variant Drags Down Travel Demand

Delta Variant Drags Down Travel Demand

August 13, 2021 ctn_admin

COVID-19 variants, such as the Delta variant, are having a dramatic impact on traveler confidence, even more-so on business travelers than leisure travelers, according to the latest monthly Traveler Confidence Index developed by Travel Again.

On the leisure side, 61% of travelers feel at least somewhat less confident about traveling due to the prevalence of COVID variants, with 1 in 20 saying the variants cause them to have no confidence in traveling. For business travelers, 65% feel at least somewhat less confident about traveling due to the prevalence of COVID variants and the number who say the COVID variants cause them to have no confidence in traveling jumps to nearly 1 in 10.

“Since the launch of Travel Again last fall, we’ve talked about the importance of putting infrastructure in place to protect travelers and the travel industry not just as we recover from COVID-19, but in a way that ensures we are ready for the future health threats that will someday come as well,” said Travel Again Co-Founder Mike McCormick. “As new variants keep coming at us, we are already seeing this play out — and if we don’t act now to address the damage it is causing to traveler confidence, it will cause irreparable damage for future travel projections.”

The July survey also revealed that business travelers are getting vaccinated at a significantly higher rate. Currently, 87% of business travelers have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine and only 7% report that they do not plan to get the vaccination. Conversely, only 62% of leisure travelers have received at least one dose of the vaccine while 17% say they have no plans of getting vaccinated.

Additional Key Findings

Business travelers who have made future reservations dropped slightly this month from 33% to 28% while leisure travelers with future bookings remained the same at 56%.
The most important confidence building elements for business travelers include vaccinations for travel providers, vaccinations for yourself and mandatory masks. On the leisure side, there was frequent cleaning, empty middle seats, mandatory masks and vaccinations for yourself.

Traveler Confidence Index: The confidence index dropped across the board following a steady recovery over the last year. On the leisure side it fell from 3.77 in June to 3.55 in July, its lowest level since April. The number of leisure travelers fully ready to travel now dropped by more than 10% from 37.3% to 26.5%. The business Index dropped from 3.66 last month to 3.48 tod