January, as the first month of the summer 2023 high season, has allowed the national tourism industry to take the pulse of the long-awaited reactivation of this sector, after the reduction of the sanitary restrictions established by the authority in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic. 19, and thus establish some changes or new modalities in the customs of national travelers in relation to last year.
According to the COCHA Insights Report, during this first month of 2023 there has been -unlike last summer (January - February 2022) in which there was a significant flow of trips to national destinations-, a strong recovery in the purchase of air tickets with an increase of 30%, especially, to international destinations and to a lesser extent, the acquisition of packages for the summer.
Specifically, the demand for purchases of flights to destinations outside the country by Chileans so far this summer 2023 has been the beaches of the Caribbean such as Punta de Cana, Cancun and Miami, as well as South American locations such as Rio de Janeiro in Brazil and Columbia.
Meanwhile, in the national territory, people have chosen to make the well-deserved rest this January mainly in the cities of Puerto Montt, Punta Arenas, La Serena, Temuco and Easter Island.
The data collected by the COCHA study reports that despite the increase of more than 20% in the price of flights as a result of the variation in the dollar and inflation, during January 2023 versus January 2022, there has been a upturn in the sector, observing an increase in ticket sales, as well as a 16% rise in the number of people traveling.
Regarding the way in which Chileans organize their summer vacations, COCHA Insights showed that in this month, in relation to January 2022, Chileans planned their trips more in advance, projecting their vacations 4 and up to 5 months in advance. . Additionally, another difference that was observed compared to January of last year, is that travelers are increasingly preferring to have the advice of travel agents to make a scheduled purchase and that allows them to access better prices on flights and packages. .
The foregoing contrasts with what happened in the summer of 2022, when Chileans planned their vacations with less time, between 1 and 2 months, mainly motivated by the sanitary restrictions established at that time by the authorities.
Regarding the duration of vacations, the report does not record major variations compared to the previous summer season, maintaining the average of 7 to 14 days for international flights, and 3 to 4 days for domestic trips.
After the pandemic, COCHA Insights revealed changes in the way Chileans vacation. In this first month of the summer season, the national tourist was more willing to travel in the low season (which begins in March and ends in November) looking for different destination opportunities.
Undoubtedly, with the arrival of the pandemic, tourism was one of the most affected economic sectors, where people had to make important changes in their family, social and work dynamics, such as stopping traveling and incorporating remote work. However, this last phenomenon -teleworking- has gradually become a growth opportunity for the tourism sector and proof of this is that Chileans are beginning to choose new ways of combining vacation trips with online work. .
Buenos Aires, Madrid, Barcelona, Miami, Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Florianópolis are the favorite destinations selected by local tourists to venture into this new vacation-teleworking trend, a modality that presents a series of advantages, such as increasing by 15 to 30 days stay in other places.
Additionally, another of the findings of the study was that although during this season there is usually a drop in demand for trips to Europe due to the arrival of winter in the northern hemisphere, an increase of 19% was reported in the sales of flights to the old continent during January 2023.
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