A Letter from PGAV Chairman Mike Konzen

We are pleased to present our sixth edition of Voice of the Visitor, PGAV Destinations’ annual study of the attractions industry based on consumer input. Each year, in partnership with H2R Market Research, we present an outlook for the coming year, covering twenty different attraction types. As we head into 2021, there has never been a more important time to scrutinize the coming year for our industry.

2021 will certainly tell the story of COVID-19 recovery. We will start this year much as we ended 2020, with cases trending high. As we saw throughout last year, an increase in COVID cases directly correlates to decreased travel intent. Yet looking into the coming months, we see cause for optimism, especially related to recovery.

How much recovery will occur in 2021? When will recovery begin for different types of attractions? We see this as primarily driven by three key factors: Ready, Willing, and Able.

READY

Readiness to travel will ultimately play out as a function of two factors: vaccine deployment and risk tolerance.

Vaccine distribution has begun, and will accelerate as we head into 2021. It is anticipated that more than 100 million Americans will be vaccinated by the summer travel season. According to Adam Sacks of Tourism Economics, vaccines will start to positively affect travel volume by the 2nd Quarter.

Readiness also relates to risk tolerance, based on each individual’s willingness to venture out, attend attractions, and generally return to pre-pandemic travel behaviors. In the coming weeks, we will explore five psychographic segments based on risk tolerance.

WILLING

Willingness is an expression of one of the most powerful aspects of recovery for the travel industry: pent-up demand.

If you are like us, you’ve been fantasizing about traveling to your favorite places for the past several months. As we have seen with past economic downturns such as the Great Recession, pent-up demand will fuel this recovery in a way that may surprise us. We will discuss how attractions can best tap into this powerful desire.

ABLE

Our ability to travel is likely to be fueled at least in part by an unprecedented increase in personal savings.

According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis (and reported by the New York Times), between March and November 2020, American’s personal savings grew by 173% as compared to the same months in 2019. This savings combined with the stimulus package passed on December 21st and potential subsequent stimulus legislation are likely to provide Americans with more than adequate resources to resume travel.

Over the next few weeks, we will explore these themes and report other important data from Voice of the Visitor: 2021 in our weekly Destinology Dispatch emails. Stay tuned.

Like you, we are strongly anticipating the recovery that is likely to occur over the coming several months. But even more importantly, we are excited to see how our industry moves forward, incorporating all that we’ve learned during this pandemic.

- Mike Konzen

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