Germany has wanderlust. This is also shown, not least, by the latest forecast from the German Travel Association. Accordingly, the industry is expecting sales of around 78 billion euros – i.e. significantly increasing income compared to recent years. The traffic light for tourism is finally green again. This is also signaled by the guests at this year’s RTL travel summit. And they also have a few ideas on how to make your vacation as inexpensive and sustainable as possible.
Positive future prospects come primarily from the cruise industry. “You can say that cruises are in demand,” summarizes Wybcke Meier, CEO of TUI Cruises, in an interview with his RTL colleagues. The trips to and from Germany in particular are already very well booked for this year, but in winter many customers are drawn to Asia or the Caribbean. Marija Linnhoff, chairwoman of the VUSR travel agency association, is also observing a “renaissance of cruises”. Already in 2022, which still had clearly noticeable Corona after-effects, around 20 million people worldwide went on a cruise. According to the Federal Statistical Office, there are now almost 30 million cruise travelers every year.
But cruises also have their downsides: the destinations where guests disembark in particular suffer enormously from the rush of day guests. Destinations such as Amsterdam, Lisbon and Venice have now introduced fees for cruise travelers. The hope: regulate the rush so that the cities are not regularly overcrowded. And cruises aren’t exactly a climate-friendly way to travel. Due to the enormous amounts of fuel required for a cruise, this type of travel is considered to be particularly harmful to the environment.
Wybcke Meier is still certain that the industry is on the right track: “Cruises don’t need to step up their game when it comes to sustainability; they are already driving innovation in the shipping sector.” This refers to the efforts of many shipping companies to switch to environmentally friendly alternatives to the heavy oil that many ships still use to sail across the world’s oceans. In the case of TUI Cruises, they are relying on methanol in the long term.
The advantage here is that combustion produces significantly fewer exhaust gases than other fuels such as diesel or gasoline. The disadvantage: converting the ships takes a while. Most shipping companies, including TUI Cruises, have set themselves the goal of climate neutrality by 2050. In the past, climate-friendly cruises will be more of a creed than a reality – which Meier also admits: It will take a while, but we are already investing in the future.
There are also investments elsewhere: Lufthansa is continuing to expand its route network this year and is now flying to more than 300 destinations worldwide, including new destinations in India and the USA. Jens Ritter, CEO of Lufthansa Airlines, was confident about the new travel year at the RTL travel summit: “The current booking situation is much better than last year.” However, the pre-Corona level has not yet been reached. But some things don’t change so quickly, not even because of a pandemic – for example the Germans’ favorite destinations. In Europe, Spain is clearly our top destination, closely followed by Italy. On the long haul, it’s the USA, regardless of whether it’s the west or east coast, Ritter reveals.
Mark Tantz, Managing Director of DER Touristik Deutschland, also has similar insights for the package tour sector: “Turkey, Spain, Greece, Tunisia and Egypt are particularly popular in the short and medium-haul sector.” In the long-distance travel sector, in addition to the USA, the Indian Ocean, the Caribbean and – quite recently – Dubai and Abu Dhabi as well as the all-time classic Thailand are booming.
No matter where the trip ends up taking you, there is one thing that all vacationers have in common this year: it will be more expensive. If you book a package holiday, you have to dig deeper into your pockets. Prices for rail and air travel sometimes rise significantly and once you reach your destination you are often confronted with rising costs. You still don’t have to write off the cheap vacation from days gone by, as all the experts in the group agree. At least if you keep a few things in mind when booking.
“Early bird beats last minute,” says Linnhoff from the Federal Travel Agency Association. Tantz and Ritter also recommend starting to plan your trip as early as possible. According to Tantz, you can still get real bargains and save up to 60 percent, especially in the package tour sector, until the end of January. After that it usually becomes more expensive, sometimes significantly. This is because we have not yet reached the capacities we had before Corona in all areas, explains Linnhoff. As a result, early bird prices dominate the market and attract many travelers, which in turn leads to last minute capacity becoming scarce. So if you’re late, you pay extra.
But other factors also play a role, especially when flying. How I get a cheap flight also depends on the destination and the travel period, says Lufthansa CEO Ritter. His advice to bargain hunters: book as early as possible and be flexible when it comes to time and destination. Instead of Mallorca again, maybe travel to Cape Verde or Albania. It’s also cheap there. However, you have to accept other restrictions, as Linnhoff points out: “In cheap travel destinations, the infrastructure is often lacking. In Cape Verde, for example, it is cheap and beautiful, but there is not as much there as in other destinations. “
By the way, traveling economically doesn’t mean just looking for a worthwhile travel destination on your doorstep. On the contrary: long-distance travel is booming again. According to the German Travel Association, the industry expects an eleven percent increase in sales in this area. “A long-distance trip to Thailand sometimes costs the same as a holiday in Spain. It’s definitely worth comparing prices here,” says Linnhoff. For the expert it is clear that the price ultimately decides where the journey goes: “I think it is already manifest in people’s minds that we should do something for the climate. But most people are not ready to do that just yet pay.”
Meier from TUI Cruises is observing a different trend among her customers: “We are seeing more conscious consumption. People are thinking more in advance about what kind of vacation they actually want to go on and are also thinking more and more about the environment.” However, people probably don’t want to miss out on the long-distance trip, as Ritter reports: “We are observing an incredible passion for and demand for long-distance travel.” He is sure that this year people will continue to be curious, want to travel and experience something new.
