A mammoth review of how and where travellers are parting with their hard-earned cash has shed light on consumer travel behaviour post global-recession.
The study, carried out by destination recommendation site TripBase, evaluated over half a million travel search preferences to determine habits by preference and budget category over almost a two-year period.
Top-line data shows that budget and mid-range travellers are "penny pinching", according to TripBase, having reduced their spending in the period August 2008 to April 2010 by 29% and 31% respeectively.
This is in stark contrast to the luxury market, which has reduced its outlay on travel by 11%.
Tripbase says it has seen the beginning of a rise, however, over the first few months of 2010 with budget travellers upping their overall spend by around $100 a month in March and April of this year.
Still, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and travel budgets as a whole were trending together until November 2009 but the former has started to grow at a quicker rate since, TripBase says.
In terms of how spend per category over the past two months, TripBase has also released the following data (per person per trip):
- Attractions - $1,777
- Nature seekers - $1,822
- Casino seekers - $2,252
- Shoppers - $2,085
- Nightlife seekers - $1,917