With the busy summer travel season approaching, UK vacationers are already starting to experience the effects. They are dealing with eye watering price hikes for all-inclusive family package deal holidays, particularly to favourite destinations such as Spain, Cyprus and Turkey. TravelSupermarket announces a huge jump in the cost of seven-night family breaks. This barrier is most pronounced for trips farelocked for the months of August 2024 and 2025.
Luke Fitzpatrick, a travel consultant at Perfect Getaways in Liverpool, reported that many customers are shortening their vacations to mitigate costs. It’s hard to believe we fit so much into just 10 nights of vacation! It’s the year of the four and seven-night getaway. With lots more people going for shorter, four or seven-night breaks, they’re thanking themselves with a speedier escape into the sunny weather. This trend is a part of the larger overall strategy of holidaymakers trying to keep their travel plans alive as prices continue to increase.
The jump in holiday expenses isn’t evenly distributed. Soaring prices have pushed the average price for a week in Cyprus up by a whopping 23% – from £950 per person to £1,166. The cost, for example, of making a return trip to Spain has increased from £835 to £914. In comparison, the average price for Greece has soared from £926 to £1,038. Another very popular holiday destination, Turkey, saw prices jump from £874 to £1,003. Journeys to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) increased at an even more staggering rate of 26%. They leapt from £1,210 in August 2024 to £1,525 this year. Meanwhile, Italy and Tunisia faced declines of 11% and 4%, respectively.
The increase in prices is due to all sorts of forces affecting the travel sector. These increases come as operational costs have skyrocketed too, Julia Lo Bue-Said, chief executive of the Advantage Travel Partnership said. Further, she reasoned as to why these increases, doggedly pushed for, are important. They offset the increasing costs of business, from escalated energy expenses for hotels to inflated food costs for hospitality and tourism have seen an upward trajectory in wages.
Fitzpatrick noted an increased desire for premium experiences with many travelers. These profits, he noted, are being fueled by an accelerating consumer shift towards premium all-inclusives. For long-haul flights, they are additionally overbooking pricier cabin seats. People are getting very creative to try and save a buck,” he said.
According to new research, the five most in-demand family holiday destinations that Brits are searching for this winter are Spain, Greece, Turkey, UAE and Portugal. Indeed, Cyprus is currently ninth in search popularity, indicating that even with increasing prices, its allure lingers. The travel public is learning quickly about the dynamic holiday pricing environment. Many are increasingly reserving shorter trips or choosing to fly out mid-week to save costs.
Here’s all the rest of what Ellie Mooney told us, as she was getting ready to go on her trip to Turkey. She described how last-minute bookings are becoming more common: “People are coming in with their suitcases asking if they can go away today or tomorrow.” Fitzpatrick quickly followed that with an inspiring tale of a pair of citizens who arrived with their passports. They arranged a flight from Liverpool to Turkey for later that night at only 2 hours notice!