Shopping holidays pipped by this rising category of Indian travellers

• Of the surveyed, 29% prefer to take shopping trips while 26% want to take theme park holidays.
  
• 60% of the respondents say that they plan to visit a foreign destination in 2023.
  
• The beaches of Goa, the scenic mountain towns of Himachal and the backwaters of Kerala attract most travel planners.
  

Mountains versus beaches is one of those age old debates. A relaxed holiday in Goa versus the fresh alpine air of Himachal, generally, everyone has a preference. Not surprisingly, a travel report by Acko in collaboration with YouGov, a market research company, finds that destinations with a scenic charm, whether the mountains or the seaside, have an equal appeal with 36% and 35% voting for each.

The report says that Indians are getting more adventurous with their travel plans with one in three having expressed a strong interest in taking adventurous holidays, i.e. 33%. A lesser few (29%) prefer to take shopping trips, 26% want to take theme park holidays, while 16% would love to go on a gastronomic holiday or what one would simply call a food trip. Not surprisingly, Dubai and Singapore top the list of foreign travel destinations for Indians.

When it comes to India, the beaches of Goa (29%), the scenic mountain towns of Himachal (26%), the backwaters of Kerala (22%), the mystical mountains of Uttarakhand (20%), and Rajasthan, which literally means ‘land of the kings,’ (20%) are the top travel destinations.

The lure of the foreign lands

60% of the respondents say that they plan to travel abroad, while 10% said that they are only planning to travel abroad in 2023. One of the reasons for more people wanting to travel abroad could be that 31% said that they want to take more international trips because of the pandemic, when their travel plans did not work out.

Also, 37% said that they will increase the duration of the trip. The findings reveal that post pandemic, international travel is back with a bang.

How much Indians spend on travel

Indians are prepared to loosen their purse strings when travelling abroad. For international leisure trips, 18% spend less than ₹1 lakh, 47% spend ₹1- 2 lakh, 24% spend ₹4 lakh to ₹6 lakh, while 11% spend above ₹6 lakh. Also, 48% said that they will allocate a higher budget to their trip post-pandemic.When it comes to domestic holidays, the majority (55%) expect it to cost less than ₹1 lakh.