The top three must visit vacation destinations with children between 12 and 18 years of age include Disney Parks, Europe and Washington, DC. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
Celebration vacations are a rising trend. 65% said they had taken celebration trips in the past 12 months. 45% of these trips were for milestone birthdays, 37% for anniversaries and 35% for weddings. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
Families are equally likely to take both weekend trips of four nights or less including a Saturday, and extended trips of five consecutive nights or more. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
69% of travelers took a vacation to celebrate a life event last year with milestone birthdays and anniversaries topping the list. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
20% of travelers are a grandparent, and 67% of those who have reached this life stage took at least one vacation with their grandchildren last year. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
Family travelers are more likely to have taken a vacation in their local area (less than 50 miles from home) as an alternative to vacationing in a destination that would have required traveling a greater distance. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
31% of families took a last minute trip last year, departing an average of just six days after deciding to take the trip. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
All family travelers surveyed have access to the Internet at home, and practically all have gone online to get information about travel suppliers and make reservations. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
90% of families surveyed have a page posted on Facebook, and 23% has visited a blog to seek or preview information about a vacation destination or travel service supplier. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
32% of families surveyed are interested in taking a cruise vacation during the next two years. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
Children play an active role in planning vacations in half of all family travel households. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
24% of travelers have stayed in a vacation home or condominium rental as an alternative to conventional hotel/resort lodging on a vacation last year. Ypartnership/Harrison Group 2010 Portrait of American Travelers
22% of travelers expect to be more environmentally conscious in their travel decisions in 2010 than they were in 2009. Trip Advisor
32% of travelers consider their carbon footprint when traveling, and as a result 44% of these travelers choose to stay at "green" or environmentally-conscious hotels 26% choose to drive rather than fly 20% travel shorter distances. A hotel having "green" policies factors into 33% of travelers' booking decisions. Trip Advisor
59% of travelers said they are brand loyal when it comes to booking hotels, with the survey revealing the top three brands to be Marriott, Hilton and Hampton Inn. Trip Advisor
The ipad was considered the No. 1 delivery method for newspaper and magazines. This is expected to impact visitor guide distributions. emarketer.com & Travel 2.0
73% of all Twitter users have tweeted less than 10 times, meaning that they log on to Twitter to receive information rather than contribute information. CNN Money
In March 2010, Facebook officially surpassed Google in the number of hits it receives each day. Experian Hitwise
In August 2010, Internet users spent more time on Facebook than on Google, spending more than 40 billion minutes on the site in August alone. Business Insider
Internet users under the age of 30 do not use e-mail as a daily form on communication. InterContinental Hotel Group
In a recent Foursquare social media campaign, McDonald s increased foot traffic by 33% during Foursquare Day and social media traffic increased by 600,000 unique followers. Mashable.com
65% of Facebook users only access the site when they are not at school or work, meaning that using social media during business hours may not be effective. Mashable.com
17% of American leisure travelers have engaged in some type of culinary or wine trip. USTA
While travel by automobile remains the primary mode of transportation for all domestic travel, travelers have responded to higher fuel prices of recent years by modifying travel patterns and driving less. TNS Travel America
As travelers continue to seek alternatives to flying and driving, rail travel is experiencing a renaissance. Amtrak has been the beneficiary of this transition and has seen a long term trend of rising ridership, from 21.7 million in FY 2002 to 27.2 million in FY 2009. Amtrak
An average of more than 74,000 passengers ride on more than 300 Amtrak trains per day. Amtrak operates a nationwide rail network that serves more than 500 destinations in 46 states on 21,000 miles of routes. The corporation employs nearly 18,000 workers. Amtrak
Despite the industry wide challenges, cruise vacations appeared recession resistant, sailing at full capacity throughout 2009 and adding impressive new vessels to the marketplace. Recreation Vehicle Industry Association
RV shipments are expected to grow 30% in 2010 to 215,900 units, up from 165,700 in 2009. Dealers report more optimism about RV sales after reaching a low point in shipments in Q1 2009. Recreation Vehicle Industry Association
In spite of the challenging economy, the large and diverse foodservice industry composed primarily of restaurants is projecting sales growth of 2.5 percent in 2010 to $580 billion. National Restaurant Association
78% of approximately 118.3 million U.S. leisure travelers participated in cultural and heritage activities on at least one of their leisure trips in the past year. Mandala Research for the U.S. Cultural and Heritage Tourism Marketing Council
Annual spending by cultural travelers is estimated at 192.3 billion annually - about half of travelers average trip expenditures are spent on activities, dining and shopping. Mandala Research for the U.S. Cultural and Heritage Tourism Marketing Council
About 285 million Americans and international travelers visited national parks and other units of the National Park System in 2009, a 3.9% increase that marked the fifth busiest year ever for the parks. The system supports more than 223,000 jobs and nearly $14 billion in economic activity across the country. NPS
U.S. theme parks attracted about 340 million visitors in 2008, producing direct spending of more than $12 billion. PricewaterhouseCoopers Global Entertainment and Media Outlook 2008-2012
28% of the U.S. adult population visited commercial casinos in 2008. During their casino visits, 75% of survey respondents ate at a fine dining restaurant, 60% saw a show, concert, or other live entertainment, and 48% visited a bar or night club. VP communications, Inc. and Peter D. Hart for the AGA
Top 5 Brand Trends on Facebook, according to Mashable.com 1. Announcing new products on Facebook first. 2. Using the Places feature to offer discounts and deals 3. Using a business page as an online store 4. Adapting a business page to provide customer feedback 5. Creating online buzz for charitable efforts Mashable.com
GroupOn s sales have reached over $500 million, and the company is worth $1.2 billion 97% of retailers featured on GroupOn want to be featured again 22% of GroupOn customers return to buy the product or service at full price Mashable.com
Ways to create value using social media: Create content attached to your brand that people naturally want to share online. Include user-generated content and user reviews. Drive traffic from social media platforms back to your website. Treat social media like a pipeline, not a destination. Use Facebook to create long-term customer relationships. Place content on Twitter that has the chance to go viral. Mashable.com
Culinary travelers are: Affluent and better educated Twice as likely to make over 100k per year Highly active, more likely to seek authentic regional experiences, spending more money per trip on state/national parks, historic sites, museums, outdoor activities and cultural activities. Quality, authenticity and sustainability are all of critical importance. USTA