Thailand to See Increase in Chinese New Year Tourism Spend

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(09/02/24)
 According to data from the global travel service
provider Trip.com, Thailand will see an increase of 44.3% in total
trip expenditure for inbound bookings during this year’s Chinese New Year (CNY) festive period
when compared to 2023’s CNY period, with expenditure for outbound travellers
increasing by 70.8%.

Chinese New Year, also known as the Lunar New
Year and Spring Festival, will officially begin this year on Saturday, 10 February
2024.

Part of the reason for increased spending could be
due to Southeast Asian tourists making longer-haul trips, with
more travellers travelling beyond Southeast Asia (SEA) for the
2024 CNY period.

Last year, 72% of CNY travel was intra-SEA, but
this has gone down to just over half (50.2%), with the other half
visiting destinations further afield.

View of Pattaya Beach from the Siam@Siam Design Hotel swimming pool. Picture by Steven Howard of TravelNewsAsia.com

Perhaps unsurprisingly, SEA countries which have
public holidays for Chinese New Year – Brunei, Indonesia,
Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam – are seeing more travel
during the week of CNY than countries which do not have official CNY public
holidays such as Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand, even though
many people and companies in those countries do celebrate the
festive period. In the week of CNY,
countries with CNY public holidays make up 69.1% of all SEA
bookings, versus 59% of all SEA bookings for the week before CNY.

Another two trends that cut across markets are the
lengthening of booking windows, and the popularity of theme parks.

Travellers are now planning their trips further in advance, with
the booking window for trips originating from Thailand more than
quadrupling – from nine days to 40 days – this CNY compared to
last year. That is similar to Malaysia, where the booking window
surged from 12 days to 51 days, with Singapore seeing an increase
of two and a half times – from 18 days to 46 days.

Meanwhile, theme parks rule the roost for most
popular attractions for tourists from Southeast Asia. Hong Kong
Disneyland is the top choice for travellers from Thailand,
Singapore and Malaysia, with Universal Studios Japan; Tokyo
Disneyland; Universal Studios Singapore; and Warner Bros Studio
Tour Tokyo – The Making of Harry Potter making up the rest of Thai
travellers’ top five overseas attractions.

“Last week, we collaborated with the Tourism Authority of
Thailand to host a Super World Trip BOSS Live livestream session
in Bangkok, which grossed THB100 million of GMV in a day,” said Diane Cui, General Manager, Trip.com
Thailand. “We are
expecting the travel industry in Thailand to continue its healthy
recovery this year, especially with the recent signing of the
visa-free travel agreement between the Thai and Chinese
governments, and look forward to welcoming more visitors from
around the world to this beautiful country.”

See also:
Thailand Tourism Press Conference at the ASEAN Tourism Forum 2024 in Vientiane, Laos

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