Travel & Trump

President Trump has wasted no time: already within his first 24 hours he withdrew the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, put a freeze on federal government hiring and instructed a weakening of Obamacare. It looks as though his first 100 days in office are going to be very busy indeed.

In his bid to ‘make America great again’ he is certainly making waves around the world. Even before his inauguration, he seemed to be upsetting people and cultures from Mexicans, Moslems, and members of the LGBT community to women in general? What kind of impact is that likely to have on the UK travel industry I wonder.

Well to start with, because we do not necessarily know what he is going to do next nor the impact of his actions, there is a lot of uncertainty around; and with uncertainty comes jittery financial markets.

If the dollar weakens that would of course be good news for the UK outbound travel industry with many currencies around the world linked to the USD. With the potential for anti-American sentiment it could be, however, that the USA itself would not be a benefactor as travellers choose other destinations to spend their greenbacks.

This in turn begs the question, what about US travellers? Are they likely to reduce their overseas travel and hunker down behind that infamous yet-to-be-built wall? This would then of course have a negative impact on the UK inbound travel industry.

Add to this the can of European worms awaiting us in Brexit and what do we have, well more questions; and not too many answers yet.

In my opinion, the biggest problem with so much uncertainty is that people start to create scare stories which can often have a self-fulfilling effect. In addition to scare stories we are also seeing a proliferation of Trump-related non-news stories. I don’t know about you but my Facebook stream seems to have at least one new one each day.

With so much news, non-news, speculation and uncertainty comes confusion and often with confusion comes inaction. Like a rabbit in headlights there is the danger the travelling public will be frozen, unable to make a holiday decision.

That is where we the travel professionals come in.

To quote from Rudyard Kipling’s famous poem:

“IF you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs…you’ll be a Man, my son!”

In other words we must stay calm and be the stable influence that the market needs.

I believe there are 3 simple guidelines we can follow:

  1. We separate fact from fiction. We keep our travel knowledge up-to-date by following the national and travel press and, of course, by completing Travel Uni product and destination online training.
  2. We follow the market. We listen to our customers and pick up on their sentiment and behaviour.
  3. We stay flexible (as far as possible). Obviously that is easier for a travel agent than say a specialist tour operator but there are always options. Incidentally while naturally we are focussed on the US there are some interesting trends coming out of China at the moment. Specifically, for the UK inbound market, Europe is back on the travel agenda. Another trend to note is that the Chinese traveller is becoming more adventurous which could signal an opportunity for tour-based operators.There is no doubt in my mind that we have some interesting times ahead but I also know that as an industry, Travel will survive and thrive, because we have done so many times before.

But please share your thoughts on what the Trump Administration might have in store for the Travel Industry and what your customers’ reaction has been so far.

Source: http://www.forbes.com/sites/hamdiraini/2017/01/24/chinese-new-year-travel-trends-to-look-out-for-in-2017/#53a7344c273d

Image credit: Copyright: http://www.123rf.com/profile_omnimoney’>omnimoney / 123RF Stock Photo

Leave a Reply