Hotelupwell.com – Tourist trends continue to change over time. Apart from environmentally friendly tourism or sustainable tourism, currently tourists prefer new or anti-mainstream destinations.
This was also expressed by the Chairman of the DPD of the Indonesian Travel Company Association (ASITA) Bali, I Putu Winastra.
According to him, currently there is a new trend where tourists prefer to explore new or little-known areas. This is one of the reasons why the long Eid 2024 holiday attracts many tourists, especially domestic ones, using travel agencies like in previous years.
“We know that during Eid the roads are not very busy because tourists are active in Buleleng, Bedugul, there are new tourist attractions in Singaraja, so evenly, the domestic market segment changes, not just Uluwatu and Tanah Lot,” he said as reported by Antara.
Even though this is bad news for the official travel agency association, where only 10 percent of the 2023 Eid holiday conditions are booked by domestic tourists, Winastra interprets this as a reminder for agents.
“That’s why I told you how we create sustainable packages, that experience is what tourists are looking for, when people live in the city they want to stay in people’s homes with traditional activities,” he said.
Sustainable Tourism Trends
Apart from that, the sustainable concept has also become a trend that ASITA Bali has noticed recently, in the international market, quite a few tourists even judge travel agencies based on tour packages and environmentally friendly behavior of guides.
While fewer and fewer domestic tourists use travel agencies, 50 percent of international tourists still use their services.
The reason is because when using the help of internet social media and brave transportation, quite a few have difficulties on the road, plus sometimes tourists even regret because the destination does not meet their expectations.
“When tourists use the internet, when something does not meet expectations, there will be a fuss, this will have a negative impact on the destination, whereas if there is a local agent we can find a solution when our product is deemed inappropriate,” said Winastra.
Another reason is that tourists’ reduced interest in using travel agents is thought to be because there was traffic jam at the end of 2023, so they decided to explore places that were not crowded and make their own schedules.
