Over 67% people planning vacay this season: Survey

New Delhi [India], Sep 29 (ANI): An online travel portal, Yatra.com, in its annual festive survey highlighting the travel trends, found that 67% respondents are planning to travel during the festival season, leveraging the long weekends.

With Diwali and Dusshera falling closer to the weekend, the survey conducted amongst 2700 respondents revealed that 73% travellers are finding this as the perfect opportunity to escape from their monotonous city schedules to indulge in short getaways.

Led by airline flash sales, the trend of booking in advance continues to be on rise with a whopping 40% respondents booking at least 1-3months in advance from their travel date.

Travellers seem to choosing accommodation wisely, with 42% and 25% opting for 3-4 star hotel and budget hotels, respectively. This clearly reflects the continued lukewarm demand for luxury accommodation post GST.

Travellers are increasingly travelling for leisure and embarking on domestic travel for shorter trips which are considerably more affordable. Only 22.7% respondents said that they would prefer taking an international vacation.

Top destinations- International

Dubai

Singapore

Thailand

Malaysia

Top Destinations- Domestic

Kerala

Goa

Rajasthan

Himachal Pradesh

Another key observation derived out of the survey was about Indian travellers preferring to travel with their families during festivals, with 63% falling under the category. 42% of the respondents said that they are looking at the festive season as a time to head out of the city or the country to explore new destinations and cultures

Commenting on the findings from the survey, Mr. Sharat Dhall, COO (B2C), Yatra.com, "The discerning Indian travellers are breaking away from the conventional mind-set of staying or visiting hometown during festival, especially if it's closer to a weekend. Indian travellers, today, are open to discovering new destinations for quick weekend getaways along with traditional sightseeing vacations. Factors like cheaper airfares and low tariffs for budget hotels, are increasingly making budget travel an attractive option."

The survey also revealed that Facebook is the most popular social media platform amongst the travellers. 83% of the respondents said that they use Facebook to post vacation updates. However, 33% of the respondents said that they are completely off social media during vacation.

Key Highlights:

- With 70.8%, there is an increase in the number of people opting to travel for leisure

- Travels seem to choose accommodation wisely, with 42% opting for 3-4 star hotel and 25% going for budget hotels

- More than 40% are willing to spend INR 1,000 - 2,500 on accommodation per night, followed by 33.6% who are willing to spend INR 2,500 - 5,000

- 38% respondents said that their per person budget for this vacation is less than INR 10, 000

- Kerala has emerged as a popular destination this festive season, followed by Goa, Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh. Dubai, Singapore and Thailand have emerged as the favourite international destinations. (ANI)