Last week, TravelPulse reported that pent-up demand was building as more and more Americans were ordered to stay home.
This week’s Harris Poll, which is tracking how Americans are dealing with the coronavirus outbreak on a weekly basis, has found that demand is continuing to build.
The survey found that 31 percent are planning to “go on vacation/travel when things return to normal.” This is up 7 percent from last week.
This is great news for travel, however, the industry should be prescient when it comes to a return to normal.
In fact, the poll asked Americans “Once the pandemic is over and things return to normal, do you think each of the following areas of your life will be very different, somewhat different or mostly the same?”
The response was that family, work and eating will remain mostly the same but travel and vacations look to be the area most impacted by the change.
Many Americans said that they believe that shopping and travel will be the categories to become somewhat different after the pandemic.
A majority think things will be at least somewhat different. Thirty-two percent say they expect travel/vacations will be very different once the pandemic is over, and 34 percent said they expect travel/vacations to be somewhat different once the pandemic is over.
However, 34 percent said that they expect travel to be mostly the same.
Americans are definitely still concerned about air and cruise travel and survey results show that those categories will take longer to bounce back.
Only 10 percent say they miss traveling on an airplane when asked what they miss the most during this time, and 20 percent say it will take a year or longer for them to fly on a plane once the curve of the pandemic flattens.
Twenty-one percent of Americans say they will stay in a hotel once stay-at-home orders are lifted and 41 percent said they would stay in a hotel within three months. Sixty percent of Americans said they would stay in a hotel within six months.
Fifty-seven percent of people said that it will take a year or more before they will take a cruise.
One of the major takeaways from this week’s poll is to consider “American resiliency” in marketing strategies.
“There is likely a ‘whiplash’ effect about to happen as the first sign that things might return to some type of normal. Upper funnel activity might soon reemerge, even in unlikely categories like travel and entertainment,” the results show.
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