Staycation may have been the 2020 buzzword in travel, however its popularity had been steadily increasing for some time before Covid-19 first landed in the UK.
Looking back across the last decade, domestic tourism has experienced healthy and consistent growth. In 2019 a total of 122.8 million overnight trips were made by British residents to destinations in England, Scotland or Wales, representing a 3.6 per cent increase on the previous year.
Although the total value of domestic vacations taken by British holidaymakers during the whole of 2021 is forecast to be 11 per cent short of pre-coronavirus levels (£12.9 billion vs £14.5 billion in 2019), analysis by Mintel suggests that the domestic market is likely to recover fully by 2022, when it will reach an estimated £15 billion.
Over the last year as many as 60 per cent of the adult population have experienced working from home, with 83 per cent of employees, also according to Mintel, now believing that they don’t always need to be in an office environment to be productive. With laptops, tablets, collaboration tools and instant messaging apps, remote working really does work.
So there may well be a new trend to watch this year which combines staycationing with the ability to work remotely. Renowned for its quality of life and work-life-balance, Scandinavia is already well ahead, with VisitNorway promoting the opportunity to 'work with a view, somewhere new'.
Known variously as the workation, workoliday or woliday, put simply it’s a concept that allows you to work in a different setting, one that’s complementary to both health and productivity. Imagine avoiding the Friday night traffic queues by leaving 24 hours early because your chosen holiday accommodation is suitably kitted out for work so your holiday can start at the end of the working day without a fraught journey running well into the night.
Holiday accommodation providers should take note of this emerging trend. Promoting key features and benefits for this market could help increase occupancy levels during quieter months and midweek dates, as well as extending the average length of booking. Leading accommodation provider holidaycottages.co.uk believes that taking a workation will become part of the new normal and is advertising its best suited properties for this very use.
If you are thinking of presenting your holiday lets as a workation destination there are a few key points to bear in mind that will vastly improve your chance of successfully tapping into the market. Reliable and genuinely fast Wi-Fi, good mobile phone signal that doesn’t require climbing half way up a hill, and a dedicated workspace with a decent desk and office chair are essential.
Additional features such as printers and a good quality coffee machine will also help the likely success of your workation proposition. And added benefits that provide authentic experiences not available in the average working environment are worth considering. Think loch-side yoga that can be arranged between virtual meetings, cycling along forest trails instead of the commute home and stargazing instead of another night in front of the TV.
These additional experiences will help differentiate your offering from the competition as well as adding value which can be monetised in rental rates.
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