Nuremberg, June 18, 2019 – Travel sales in the booking month May 2019 ends with summer sales at previous year’s good levels (May 2018: +8 percent). Increasing booking turnover in the online segment (+4 percent) nearly compensated for the losses in stationary sales (-2 percent). Thanks to good early bookings for the coming winter season (+7 percent), monthly sales in May reached a small plus of one percent overall.
The industry is hoping for a strong last-minute business this year, with 27 percent of last year’s seasonal sales remaining in order to be on the level of the 2018 summer season. Whether this hope will be fulfilled, will only prove the coming booking months, however, May is showing the first encouraging signs: a quarter of the total sales volume booked in May accounts for short-term summer bookings for the travel months May and June 2019. Compared to previous year’s month, this represents an increase of 1.6 percentage points. In return, the summer travel months July and August (29.3 percent) as well as the autumn months of September and October (21.3 percent) account for a lower share of sales than in the previous year.
With total summer sales at the previous year’s level, the cumulative balance sheet remains at minus two percent. The summer season 2019 is running against a particularly strong previous year’s season, which at that time cumulatively had a sales increase of 14 percent. If the industry were to compare with the summer of 2017, the current balance sheet would show good growth.
The comparatively good short-term bookings in the past booking month May particularly benefited the travel month June with its holidays over Whitsun. However, its sales increase of currently 10.6 percent is not sufficient to compensate for the losses made in May (-15.0 percent). The travel months during the major summer holidays in July and August are currently still 2.8 and 2.0 percent below the previous year’s sales. Small increases in comparison to the previous month can be seen in October: the summer season’s last travel month is the only one with a current positive sales balance (+4.7 percent), in addition to June. The early bird proves to be an unchanged stable component in the travel industry: at 24.3 percent in the booking month May, almost a quarter of total turnover was due to travel bookings for the winter season 2019/20 and later. Compared to the same month last year, the early bird also gained 1.4 percentage points in terms of revenue.
Legend:
The chart shows the travel revenues generated in May 2019 and cumulated until the end of May 2019 for the 2019 summer season compared to the previous years. Holiday travel bookings both in stationary travel agencies and online on travel portals of the organizers and Online Travel Agencies (OTAs) with a focus on package tours are taken into account. The left-hand side of the chart shows how much revenue has been accumulated in percent for the summer season compared to the previous year’s season (final result).
About Travel Insights
The tourism sales panel Travel Insights is based on booking data from approximately 2,000 travel agencies, which represent the stationary distribution market in Germany in a representative way. In addition, booking data of the classic travel portals and tour operators is gathered online. Projected to the overall market, Travel Insights’ evaluations allow reliable conclusions on the booking and travel behavior of German tourists. Current trends and developments in the tourism market can be traced in a timely manner. The core business of travel agencies and the online travel portals of the organizers and so-called OTAs (Online Travel Agencies) is based on package holidays or vacations booked by.
Further Information:
Sven Bochmann, info@traveldataanalytics.de, Telefon: +49 (0)911 951 510 00
About Travel Data + Analytics
Travel Data + Analytics GmbH (TDA), founded by Dr. Markus Heller, took over the tourist trade panel of Travel Insights from GfK in April 2019. Until the end of the current tourism year 2018/19, i.e. until the end of October 2019, the booking data of the travel distribution and analyses will continue to be processed by GfK’s systems. At the same time, system development is executed on the part of TDA. With the completion of the transition phase, all booking data will be loaded retroactively from the tourism year 2016/17, in order to ensure a seamless transition. The Travel Insights team will continue their work as an independent and autonomous entity from Nuremberg.