The over-50s holiday market is booming, but what are its nuances? Rob Gill reports on Silver Travel Advisor’s annual industry report.
Over-50s holidaymakers are cutting back on their travel spending this year, although the luxury end of the market is proving more “robust”.
The Silver Travel Advisor Industry Report 2019 found there was a rise from 67% to 77% in the number of over-50s taking up to three holidays in 2019, but conversely the number taking four or more breaks fell from 33% to 23% per year.
The research also revealed that 42% of those surveyed were planning to spend between £1,000 and £3,000 on holidays this year – down by three percentage points from 45% in 2018.
In a sign this group of consumers will splash out less on travel in 2019, there was an increase in those spending up to £1,000 per year from 20% last year to 28% for 2019. But the number of over-50s spending more than £5,000 (12%) remained steady year-on-year.
Despite this fall in holiday spending, most consumers aged over 50 (65%) still think their holiday plans have not changed over the past year.
Debbie Marshall, managing director of Silver Travel Advisor, said: “Things are beginning to polarise, with the luxury end of the market holding steady but more people spending less than £1,000 per head on travel than last year.”
Encouragingly for the trade, nearly one third (31%) of over-50s booked their “more complex” holidays with a travel agent either by visiting a shop (18%), by phone/email (6%), or online (7%). The number of these bookings through agents has been “virtually unchanged” since 2016.
But 58% of respondents make more “straightforward” travel bookings – such as flights and accommodation – online themselves, with only 8% making these transactions by visiting an agency.
“An encouraging 31% of people are recognising the value and expertise travel agents offer when it comes to booking more complex holiday options, such as cruises and escorted tours, and cruising overall received a huge thumbs-up from the silver sector, with very high intentions to rebook, especially for river cruises,” added Marshall.
The report also found a trend towards earlier booking from over-50s, with nearly half (49%) booking six months in advance – up from 41% a year ago. This included 6% who booked more than a year ahead of travel.
As for the types of holidays, city breaks retained top spot at 45% ahead of beach holidays (33%) and UK breaks (30%). There were also increases in the popularity of all-inclusive, cultural and luxury holidays, which were all up by three percentage points year-on-year.
More than 80% of those surveyed took the travel brand into consideration as an “indicator of quality” when deciding who to book with. The biggest influences on this choice of company were previous good experiences, Atol protection (up by five points year-on-year), company reputation and good customer service.
Getting the cheapest price and “extra value” were rated as the least important factors.
The report revealed that only one-third had so far taken an ocean cruise, with two-thirds of those people wanting to take another voyage. Non-cruisers said the main reasons for not trying cruise were a perception it was too expensive and not wanting to be “part of a crowd swamping a small destination”.
Silver Travel Advisor also looked at the trend of older people going on solo holidays – 55% did this because they had nobody else to travel with, while 20% preferred solo travel and 15% did so because they had different interests to their partner.