In a move away from the ‘T’ word, TourRadar shared insights into the future of multi-day ‘organised adventures’ at the Adventure Together Brisbane event on 22 August 2024 with a host of Australian tour operators, partners, travel media and advisors.
Australian-born TourRadar Co-Founder & CEO Travis Pittman flew in from the travel company’s Vienna headquarters to highlight the latest multi-day touring trends, including those shaping the future of travel, and led a spirited panel discussion on relevant industry topics.
With high-level execs from many global tour operators in attendance, including The Travel Corporation, Intrepid Travel, G Adventures, MW Tours and Explore Worldwide, On the Go Tours, the Brisbane event followed similar gatherings in Marrakesh, Toronto and Vienna with Ecuador and Turkey next month.
Established in 2010 by brothers Travis and Shawn Pittman, the TourRadar platform now features 2,500 operators and 24,000 partners and has provided tour options for four million travellers to 160 countries.
TourRadar travel trends for Aussies
For leisure travel preferences, Pittman shared that the TourRadar customer adheres closely to wider category trends with Australians making up 20 per cent of its bookings.
Overwhelmingly, Aussies are booking outbound multi-day tours with Europe as the brand’s number-one destination.
While 2023’s revenge travel trend has levelled out for Europe, TourRadar is seeing growth for Asia (44%) and the Americas (35%).
Trending destinations among Aussies include Sri Lanka (up 363%), India (up 109%), South Korea (up 67%), Vietnam (up 41%), Japan (up 35%), Costa Rica (167%), multi-country Latin America (135%) and Peru (24%) while both US and Canada growth is 21 per cent.
Aussies also opt for off-the-beaten-path adventures with almost half of all bookings (48%) to developing countries.
Almost one-third (31%) of TourRadar customers are couples in their 60s, followed by Millennials at 15 per cent and Gen Z at 24 per cent.
Like other tour brands, the company has seen an increase in solo travellers, mostly women, particularly among Millennials (60%) and Gen Z (63%).
Millennials and Gen Z are often the most spontaneous travellers with 47 per cent booking less than three months in advance.
September is the most popular travel month for Australians with 28 per cent of outbound bookings purchased less than three months before departure, while November is the most popular month for Aussies to book domestic adventures.
TourRadar noted that November has become a significant booking month with Black Friday deals driving 40 per cent of Q4 bookings.
The future of FIT travel…is touring?
As a predictor of future travel preferences, TourRadar’s main takeaway for agents is Australians are increasingly looking at off-peak months for travel and lesser-known destinations.
Tech startup Equator Founder & CEO Edmund Morris also shared his data company’s predictions for the future of travel modelled on sustainable choices.
He warned that two fundamental shifts will define tourism over the next 25 years: overtourism and climate change.
“So it’s going to get more crowded and more volatile at the same time,” Morris told the mostly tour operator crowd.
“Europe has been your market for the longest time, and will continue to be incredibly important, but Asia is the next outbound destination forever. There is almost no scenario where Europe will ever be bigger than Asia from now on.
“And it’s about to get a lot busier. So, when you see overtourism charts, don’t think this is peak tourism. Think: this is the beginning.”
Similarly, he said destination preferences will change based on climate disasters and the related insurance costs.
However, he pointed to the positive impact of tourism on local communities and environments that tour operators can leverage as a point of difference.
Morris said the tourism industry should stop trying to educate consumers about sustainability, underlining the importance of storytelling and highlighting unique cultural and environmental assets to attract travellers.
“People travel to indulge. They want to travel sustainably but they’re not going to ask about it,” he said.
“How you sell sustainable products, how you meet that consumer demand, you have to appeal to the thing they want to avoid.
“If crowds are going to massively increase – and they are – and if climate change is going to get worse – and it is – consumers are going to be rapidly changing their minds about what they want to do.
“Tour operators have the most amazing opportunity here, which is you can sell the entire travel ecosystem – it’s all done for the consumer. Find the thing that is unique and drive consumers towards it.
“Organised adventures is the only industry in the world that generates an economic asset that is not destroying, transforming or disrupting it.
“It means you have the best story to tell in sustainability around preserving culture, heritage and conservation,” he said.
Bringing sexy back to touring?
Pittman shared the origin of TourRadar’s pivot from multi-day tours to organised adventures that encapsulate the entire category and lift traveller perceptions.
“I think we all can agree that the term multi-day tour, it’s not very sexy. It’s not something that travellers really get excited about or inspired about. So we said, how do we bring the category together and change that perception?” he said.
“So we came up with the term ‘organised adventures’. And it’s an oxymoron. How can an adventure be organised? But at the end of the day, that’s what it is. It’s being organised. It is an adventure. You have the flexibility. We have everything taken care of.
“We know that everyone loves a good travel hack and we actually think that organised adventures are the ultimate travel hack, because where else can you go, click, book, turn up and then have everything taken care of for you?”
