PALO ALTO, CA, April 27, 2010) – Tripbase, the destination recommendation engine named Top travel Web site 2008 for Destination Ideas by Travel and Leisure Magazine, announces results of a global spending preference study that gauges where travelers are willing to spend their money and where they are not. Over a half million people worldwide and their travel search preferences were included in the study to determine spending habits by interest preferences, budget category and throughout the recession.
Budget and mid range travelers are penny pinching and hurting more from the recession than others with per trip budget declines of 28.73% and 31.10% respectively, compared to a much smaller dip of 10.59% for the luxury segment. Bucking an 18 month downward trend, increases in budget per trip began again in February 2010 and continued with an additional $100 per month allocated for March and April 2010 bookers. The Dow Industrial Average and travel budgets were trending together until November 2009, at which point travel budgets have lagged behind the Dow’s rise.
The cheapest spenders came from the top two most popularly searched categories, attractions at $1,776.70 per person per trip, followed by nature seekers who averaged $1822.28 per trip. Dining, nightlife and shopping ranked 3rd, 4th and 5th in most common preference searches, followed by budget and weather, among the 12 interest preferences that Tripbase currently sorts results by. Popular and iconic destinations remain supreme with only 2% of travelers selecting to hide popular destinations in their search.
Good news for Europe, 92.13% of people selected Europe as a continent choice for their next trip, topping the list, followed by followed by North America, Central America and Caribbean and South America where we’re willing to still spend on a vacation. Africa was selected the least, with the Middle East, Asia and Oceania following.
In the past two months, Tripbase’s study shows that casino and nightlife enthusiasts are returning more quickly to their prior spending habits and getting over the recession more quickly. The preference that matches the most amount of money per person per trip comes from casino vacationers, with an average of $2,251.98. Luxury spending among casino seekers is up $492.54 per trip, mid range spending up $316.72 per trip and budget spending up $140.53 per person per trip when a casino is involved. Shoppers came in next with an average cost of $2085.30 per trip, diners with an average of $2,006.09, nightlife seekers $1917.36, nature seekers $1822.28 and attraction seekers, $1776.70. Mid range and luxury travelers both spend the most on shopping and the least on attractions. Budget travelers spend the most on nightlife and the least on nature activities.
Tripbase searches through millions of traveler reviews and thousands of travel Web sites and scientifically weighs data to recommend only the most personalized and perfect vacation. Tripbase provides a layer of intelligence to travel research that no one else in the industry has. Tripbase only serves up destinations with the preferences you want using everything out in the world wide Web, sorted by your preferences and weighted with algorithms that take into consideration how we make decisions and key world relevance and tells the traveler, “based on this data, you would like this destination.” Tripbase cuts through the chaos of too much information and takes the pain out of researching by matching travelers to the right destination every time they travel.
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About Tripbase
Founded in May 2007, Tripbase pioneered the Internet’s first “destination discovery engine,” making searching for travel all about the personal preferences of the traveler. Tripbase lets users choose what is important to them for their travels and eliminates the time-consuming and frustrating online search process of sorting through potential travel destinations that might not be a perfect fit. Tripbase was named Top travel Web site 2008 for Destination Ideas by Travel and Leisure Magazine. For more information, please visit www.tripbase.com.
