Group tours losing favor with Chinese travelers
Changing times lead to changing customs. In China, as tourism becomes an increasingly mainstream pastime, a growing number of Chinese tourists express a preference for traveling solo, with friends or as a family rather than with an organized tour group.
Does this mean we're nearing the end of buses of Chinese tourists, who, watches in hand, have only a few minutes to snap their photos in front of the Empire State Building or the Eiffel Tower?
According to Hotels.com and the latest research from its Chinese International Travel Monitor (CITM), the answer could be yes.
"The CITM research explodes the myth that Chinese travelers only travel in groups," the hotel price comparison website points out in a release, noting that two thirds (67%) of Chinese survey respondents said they preferred to make their own travel arrangements. Young respondents were particularly likely to express this preference.
This represents a five percentage point increase from the 2013 edition of the CITM, in which 62 percent of respondents said they preferred to avoid organized group travel. Among hotel owners, 60 percent echoed this trend by reporting an increase in the number of Chinese tourists traveling outside of organized groups over the past two years.
The 2014 edition of Hotels.com's CITM surveyed 3,000 Chinese tourists and 3,000 hotel owners worldwide.
