Tourism rebuilt by Covid-19

Over the past year, each of us has tried, in our own way, to reproduce the feeling of traveling from home. With transcontinental zoom calls, new dining experiences, and "live" online events, we've tried to substitute the feeling of going on a trip. However, by its very definition, travel can't really be experienced that way.

Today, as we reach the end of 2021, more and more countries are cautiously opening their borders. Europe has started to move. With the revitalization of the travel industry, what are the factors that will shape our travel decisions in a post-Covid era?

Human-centred tourism

According to Fabio Carbone, an academic specializing in tourism, post-Covid tourism should also focus more on people than on destinations. Those who wish to move away from measures such as social distancing will likely use travel to embrace existing relationships with loved ones living abroad or seek new encounters.

Fabio Carbone suggests that because of this, post-Covid tourism will turn to the priority of human development, dialogue and peace. Popular types of tourism will therefore be likely to also include trips to visit friends and relatives or volunteer tourism.

Volunteering or voluntourism is a niche tourist activity that essentially consists of volunteering in a foreign destination. With the economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic hitting developing countries harder, effective voluntourism is not only desired, it is necessary.

Short trip for 2021 and long trip for 2022

Intrepid Travel says that in 2022, people are ready to book more "far away" destinations. Donna Jeavon of Trafalgar confirmed that her clients are booking "closer to home in the short term, but they are certainly looking for longer journeys for 2022 and beyond". Angela Sloan, head of sales at Uniworld UK, says the trust in vaccines is the reason behind this.

Working from anywhere in the world?

As the world of telecommuting came into play, the boundaries between work and personal life shifted and blurred. The reframing of work culture during the pandemic has given way to an unintended consequence: the reframing of leisure.

A trend that has emerged in the travel industry: "Working from anywhere". Rather than an act of escape, the trip was integrated into a regular workday, mixing two worlds into one.

Luxury travel company Black Tomato says the new trend reveals a paradigm shift in professional culture, but also offers an opportunity for destinations to become inspiring for longer and extremely private stays.

More and more countries have launched visas for mobile workers, called "Digital Nomad Visa" in 2021. A boon for globetrotters at heart who did not have, until then, this opportunity. Among these countries we can mention, Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba, Barbados, Bermuda, The Cayman Islands, Iceland, Dubai, Mexico, Georgia, Mauritius. Having planned everything to accommodate teleworkers, these countries are participating in the change in organizational culture, a change that will become the new post-Covid norm.

Nostalgia for the "old normal"

Despite our best efforts, there is no doubt that the pandemic has separated us. Whether we're thousands of miles away from home when airports around the world closed or next to elderly relatives who couldn't be put at risk, the coronavirus has separated us from our loved ones.

The Black Tomato agency predicts that we will want to find our friends and family. Multigenerational groups or groups of friends traveling together are popular. "We find that our travelers are certainly always looking for opportunities to travel together, having spent much of the last year separated from their loved ones," says Anna Vine, Head of Marketing at Contiki Holidays.

With a new perspective on what really matters, travelers revisit sentimental places. Some couples return to their honeymoon destination and others return to their most memorable vacation destinations. The rediscovery of our most special moments tells us that it is not the act of traveling alone that is worth it, it is the people we travel with and the memories we cultivate together.

Conscious travel on the rise

The idea that the pandemic has put the world on pause has become a cliché. Yet, there is some truth in this. As the world stopped traveling, we had time to think about what it meant to us and the impact it had on the world.

Travel agencies predict that the new world of travel is likely to be slower than before. Whether ecologically or health-conscious, we are more aware than ever of the fragility of our environment and our responsibility to take care of it. Anna Vine of Contiki says her clients are traveling "more meaningfully and consciously than ever”.

Road trips more popular than ever

Air travel is unlikely to disappear, but it is definitely in decline. Instead of multi-stop trips, travelers choose to fly to a destination, then continue by "road trip", it is any trip that takes place by train, car, bike ... This is also partly because the duration of holiday bookings for this year tend to be longer than before. Employees have holidays they didn't want to take in 2020 and are ready to do anything now.

"Lockdown fatigue" also plays a role in this regard. Our new appreciation of what we earn when we travel also contributes to a longer vacation. Black Tomato observes that tourists are now more interested in "discovering the culture of a place by spending a month or more working remotely in the countryside, learning a new skill, or having a mental and physical reset. Rather than rushing to the cities trying to stuff yourself into all the sights, "traveling after Covid19 will be more about how you do things and less about what you visit.

Travel agencies in high demand

People are spending more time than ever looking for trips before booking. Travel agencies receive a lot of requests from customers who have never used an agency before. They may want the financial security that comes with booking through a company, after a year of cancellations.

Contactless payment: an obligation not a choice?

Contactless payments were already a common trend before the pandemic. Brands like Apple, Google and Samsung started adding digital wallets to their mobile products as early as 2014.

In recent years, we have also seen a number of airlines adapt to this trend. Singapore Airlines, Finnair, Delta, JetBlue British Airways and China Southern Airlines have already adopted digital payment solutions such as Alipay, Google Pay and Apple Pay to meet the needs of modern travellers and provide a simpler payment process.

In early 2020, Munich Airport became the first airport in Europe to offer a new mobile payment process for customers. The "Smart Checkout – Tap, Pay & Enjoy" app allows consumers to use their smartphone to pay for purchases on stores by scanning the price tag, eliminating waiting times at checkout. Unlike existing payment systems on the European market, there is no need to download the app, which simplifies the user experience.

The pandemic has further accelerated this trend, insinuating consumers to change their behavior and airports, airlines and retailers to accelerate their adoption of technology.

According to SITA's annual Air Transport IT Insights study, 74% of airlines said they want to allow contactless mobile payment for all air services provided throughout the journey, from booking to arrival.In flight. The trend is also accelerating and last October, United Airlines, for example, announced that it would test contactless digital payment on some routes to improve its on-board shopping services.

After the pandemic, it seems that our travels will be slower and more thoughtful. In many ways, they will reflect last year. Contactless will be favored. Well-being will be prioritized more than ever. The way we travel tells us something about what it's like to be human.The promotion of destinations will no longer make sense. The travel industry has no choice but to reshape vacations by meeting our desires and needs.