Tours to Europe, Japan, Taiwan sell well during Lunar New Year

The long holiday makes tourists decide to choose high-end tours and travel far during the 2024 Lunar New Year.

According to many travel agencies, the 7-day Lunar New Year holiday in 2024 will help tourists have more diverse choices of destinations, especially distant and expensive destinations.

Ms. Tran Phuong Linh, Marketing and Information Technology Director of BenThanh Tourist, said that currently, a segment of customers tend to tighten their spending. Therefore, the business will focus heavily on the mid-range and high-end customer segments to optimize business efficiency. Tourism products serving this segment are also carefully invested, with high-class and luxurious service quality.

At the end of 2023, Google released a report on the overall situation of Vietnam, showing that the high-spending group spent an average of 5.4 times more than the low-spending group. In terms of tourism, the high-spending group spent 4.9 times more than the low-spending group.

As of the afternoon of January 3, the company's statistics show that Lunar New Year tours to Europe (priced at VND90-125 million), Australia (about VND68 million), Dubai (about VND45 million) currently only accept 1-3 guests per group. The Egypt discovery tour also only has 5 seats left, while Northeast Asian routes such as Taiwan, Japan, Korea, mainland China (priced at VND18-37 million) are booked by many customers. Of these, the Japan tour was fully booked early and had to open an additional tour, departing on the second day of Tet.

Viet Travel Company confirmed that it has stopped accepting customers for tours to faraway places such as the US, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia due to capacity. They have now entered the stage of preparing services for groups. Best Price also noted that the most booked foreign tours are mid-range to high-priced products such as Taiwan, Korea, Japan, Australia, and Europe. Taiwan tours alone account for 40% of the total foreign tours sold during this time.

However, according to some companies, purchasing power for Southeast Asian products this year is quite slow, especially in destinations such as Cambodia, Singapore, Philippines, Bali (Indonesia). However, tours to Thailand are still popular and almost sold out because of the diverse experiences, cheap prices, and ready position for Vietnamese customers.

Tours to Europe, Japan, and Taiwan sell well during Lunar New Year — **Meguro River in Tokyo (Japan) during cherry blossom season.** Photo: Wanderlust Crew

Ms. Tran Thi Bao Thu, Director of Marketing and Communications Department of Vietlux Travel Company, said that Tet tour prices increased by about 5-15% compared to normal times, not much different from previous years. Domestic routes during Tet are less competitive than international routes due to increased demand for domestic travel, and transportation costs account for a large proportion of domestic tour prices.

Currently, Vietlux has completed 80% of its business plan with foreign tours. Foreign tours account for about 60% of the company's total Lunar New Year tours. According to Ms. Thu, during peak seasons, airfares for foreign routes also increase but at a stable rate, around 5%, while land tour prices do not change much. This helps travel businesses easily adjust their business plans.

This company expects domestic tourism to have a synchronous campaign, incentives on airfares and many other services such as restaurants, hotels, tourist attractions, and means of transportation to positively impact tour prices, customer demand, and increase the competitiveness of the domestic tour market.

A representative of Vietnam Tourism shared that during peak periods such as Tet, it is difficult to expect low airfares. The current situation of domestic flights being more expensive than international flights continues. Typically, for tours from Ho Chi Minh City to Hanoi and visiting the northern provinces, round-trip airfares range from around 7 million VND per person. The price of a package tour is around 10 million VND per person, almost equal to a 5-day, 4-night tour to Thailand (about 11 million VND per person).

A representative of BenThanh Tourist said that currently, domestic tours have sold about 60%, and they expect a positive change in the near future because customers often book close to the date. According to Ms. Linh, the trend of choosing domestic tourist destinations focuses on places with beautiful natural landscapes, unique cultural experiences and many entertainment activities for families. Therefore, tours to the North and islands are still the top choices.

However, due to the impact of the economic recession, tourists have been more frugal in their spending. The tour price factor is considered more carefully by tourists before making a decision, good-priced products that stimulate demand will be more attractive. A part of tourists will choose days or flight times that are not peak during Tet to get a better price.

According to vnexpress.net

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