With just a few days to go before 2024, COCHA reveals the trends in the tourism market in 2023 and what it predicts for the coming year. The market's leading travel agency highlights that the Caribbean and South American destinations are the preferred locations for Chilean travelers.
Now that the so-called “year of recovery of the tourism sector” has ended, according to data from the Latin American and Caribbean Air Transport Association (ALTA), during the first half of 2023 in South America and the Caribbean the crisis in the movement of goods had been left behind. passengers began in 2020 as a result of the pandemic confinement, presenting a recovery greater than 100%.
Furthermore, as reported by the COCHA Insights report, throughout 2023 tourism has not only shown a recovery, but has also reinvented itself, with the most luxurious options such as First Class and full service packages being popular, representing an increase of 15% compared to 2022.
Trends 2024
According to data collected by COCHA, trends around service personalization will be the most popular for the coming year, where this type of product is expected to be identified in both corporate and leisure travel, projecting a growing increase in this last category.
“Our industry has left behind the declines resulting from the pandemic and we hope it will continue to grow in the coming years. The learnings that he left us are directly related to the trends that we detected such as the personalization of trips, travelers' concern for sustainability and their well-being," explains Daiana Mediña, marketing manager at Cocha.
The study also showed that the market orientation points towards this evolution in travel, highlighting certain innovative characteristics in the tourist service:
Proximity: It has been shown that passengers tend to prefer experiences close to home when choosing their vacations. The main reasons lie in the ease of going to nearby destinations and the good quality-price ratio.
Hybrid trips: One of the benefits that the pandemic has left is the definitive introduction of teleworking, which has allowed employees of companies that have adopted this form of performance to make their work trips compatible with leisure experiences and vice versa.
Bleisure / Focus on traveler well-being: Companies are increasingly interested in offering their collaborators services whose experience focuses on their physical, psychological and emotional well-being. The popularity of Bleisure allows new clients to make the most of their corporate trips, also taking advantage of leisure time between work.
Sustainability: Society, and therefore, travelers, have adopted an environmental awareness in recent years, which is why the majority prefer services with a sustainable perspective, looking for more friendly and respectful options with the natural environment.
Personalization: Travelers will lean towards options that offer an experience adapted to their interests and budgets, looking for top-level personalized service from agencies.
New technologies
The use of artificial intelligence in tourism services is another aspect that is beginning to be reflected in the evolution of the market. The incorporation of new technologies intelligently optimizes processes such as online shopping and the personalization of experiences.
COCHA has already incorporated tools in this sense, today it has a consulting bot that uses artificial intelligence to study algorithms in order to deliver a tourism consulting service that is as personalized as possible.
“This system has the capacity to process millions of prices for more than 20 thousand trip combinations in a single day, and is continually searching for the most appropriate price per destination,” comments the marketing manager.
Trending and emerging destinations
The destinations that COCHA labels as popular for 2024 are similar to the favorites during 2023. However, there are some new locations that have gradually emerged as alternatives to the usual preferences of local travelers.
“In the Caribbean, in addition to the classic destinations such as Punta Cana, Cancún or Playa del Carmen, other emerging locations that have reached high levels of popularity such as Puerto Rico, Belize and the Bahamas have joined us,” explains the executive.
The attractive landscape, the tropical climate and its paradisiacal beaches mark the preference of Chilean travelers to these locations. In addition, the popularity of these destinations has also been consolidated by their tourism development, which provides travelers with a complete experience based not only on the transfer, but also on the hotel service.
At the South American level, Brazil has always been presented as the preferred destination for Chilean travelers, due to the popularity of locations such as Rio de Janeiro, Florianópolis and Buzios, but COCHA highlights the emergence of new alternatives in the north of the country, such as Natal and Maceió, in addition to all the resorts in Rio Grande do Norte.
“This 2023, Brazil has established itself as the favorite destination for Chileans. Of traveling families, 55% choose this country as an option, while with couples and solo travelers this percentage corresponds to 36% and 9% respectively,” says Mediña.
Although international destinations enjoy great popularity, COCHA indicates that at least 19% of national travelers prefer to make trips within the country and explain that this popularity is evident in traveling to cities such as Viña del Mar, Easter Island. , Temuco, Puerto Montt and La Serena, the latter, in addition to their own attractions, are gateways to other widely visited destinations such as the lake area of the ninth region, the island of Chiloé and the Elqui Valley, respectively.