Long lines. Crowded attractions. High prices. In a post-Covid world, people were willing to put up with these inconveniences and more, just to be able to explore the world again after a long period of lockdowns. Those days are over.
Take Kathryn Quigley, who has had her fill of bucket-list trips for now. While visiting Europe with her mother and two children for a long-delayed birthday celebration, the professor of journalism at New Jersey’s Rowan University toured all of the Parisian highlights before coming down with a nasty case of Covid-19, despite her best precautions. The illness left her drained and just hanging on until the end of the vacation. The physical—and financial—toll of the trip means she’s not eager to splash out on another dream destination soon: “After that, I told my kids if we do anything this summer, it will just be chill.”
She’s not the only one. This summer, airfares dropped both month over month and year over year. And while some—particularly wealthier—sightseers are still jet-setting internationally, domestic travel has fallen. Yet people are willing to spend for the right trip. A recent survey by PayPal Holdings (ticker: PYPL) found that nearly three-quarters of Americans are willing to change their daily spending so they can afford travel—forgoing things like alcohol, haircuts, and takeout food—and a quarter are willing to trade down to more budget-friendly locations.
The takeaway is obvious. Binge travel is out; bliss travel—meaningful, relaxing, frictionless trips for everyone who was run ragged by revenge vacations—is in.
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