US Day and Weekend Travelers

• This brief contains information on the travel patterns of people residing in the US, including people traveling as families, those traveling individually, people traveling for long vacations, those traveling for weekend getaways, people traveling for business, people traveling for leisure, those traveling with children, and people traveling without children.

Demographic Profile

• According to FTA.NYU, most Americans love shorter vacations of about 1-3 nights. A survey conducted by FTA.NYU showed that about 65% of Americans had taken travel of about 1-3 days (Weekend travel).
•  American family travelers can be classified into three groups: cautious travelers, hassle-free travelers, and intrepid travelers. Cautious travelers' travel decisions are usually influenced by worry and uncertainty. Hassle-free travelers consider travel as a time for relaxation and indulgence and intrepid travelers are often experienced travelers.
• According to Access, about 20% of all travelers in the US are Millennials, and that they (Millennials) love to travel to places with cultural or historical importance.
•  Access showed that income level affects travel and reported that high-income travelers are more likely to have diversified travel, including adventure travel, music events, and cruise. Low-income travelers often travel independently and use public transport, such as trains.
• About 62% of the people making plans for travel are from the Southern region of the US and only about 35% of people planning to travel are from the Northern region of the US.
• About 50% of people in the US who travel individually have a diploma or a university degree and about 35% of US travelers have a postgraduate degree.

Psychographic Profile

• The main reasons for travel, including regional travel are to visit new places and explore together (about 49% of Americans), to relax and unwind together (about 42% of Americans), and to be active and outdoors together (about 6% of Americans).
• Travelers in the US prefer discounted travel because they anticipate incurring high expenditures during weekend or vacation travel.
• About 81% of US travelers say travel brands ought to provide personalized experiences to their customers and about 84% of Millennials and about 73% of non-Millennials indicated that they plan travel based on other people's travel photos or social media updates.
•  US leisure travelers aged 18–34 years mostly use their mobile phones to identify travel destinations and about 89% of Millennials relied on online content posted by their peers when making travel decisions. About 31% of Millennials indicated that provision for posting holiday pics online is a key determinant of their travel decisions.
• On how US leisure travelers get travel information, Access reported that about 58% of US travelers relied on any user-generated content, about 32.5% relied on hotel reviews, about 30% relied on travel reviews of destinations, about 14% relied on travel blogs, about 33% relied on Facebook and about 26% relied on group discount websites.
• According to the US Travel Association, shopping, visiting friends and relatives, good dining, and sightseeing. About 85% of US travelers use their phones to book travel activities, including restaurant reservations and sightseeing tours, and close to 50% of activity bookings are done about one week before the day of the event.
•  Value Penguin highlighted that most US families own or lease the vehicles they use for travel and about 2% of the families rent a vehicle for travel. Only about 0.5% of Americans use recreational vehicles for travel.

Research Strategy

• To determine the audience segment that lives in Texas who are looking to plan day or weekend trips or are interested in travel in general, your research team studied travel information on various websites, including Texas Travel, Travel Texas, and Texas Government. Unfortunately, all the sites searched contained information on the people traveling from other regions to Texas and Texans traveling abroad. We proceeded to search for information on the audience segment that lives in Oklahoma who are looking to plan day or weekend trips or are interested in travel in general from sources such as Oklahoma Government and Oklahoma Travel Industry Association. The team was unable to find relevant information on Texas and Oklahoma from these sources and we opted to collect information on people that live in the US who are looking to plan day or weekend trips or are interested in travel in general.