Travel plan idea blog

Marketing travel in a bad economy: travel as necessity

Here's an article on Arizona and their efforts to get tourists to spend money.

new figures that show consumer savings in May were up 1.4 percent over the same period a year earlier. More to the point, that savings rate reached a 15-year high.

But in an industry dependent on people having disposable income, that's not a good thing.

"It's the new 'normal,'" Johnson said. And that, she said, means having to find new ways to get would-be travelers to spend more and save a little bit less.

"We have to position travel as a necessity," she said. That means stressing the importance of the physical and psychological benefits of travel.

I can't say I'm surprised that we have state government agencies encouraging people not to save money. I still don't like it though. People need to save money.

Sure we also need to travel. I certainly agree that traveling is healthy. But why not try to help travelers spend less? Why do we have to spend our marketing dollars on getting people not to save?

Posted by James Trotta at July 12, 2009 1:44 PM