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James Stranko shares thoughts on supply and demand in travel and explores the changing definition of business travel.

Hello and welcome to Issue 3 of On the Road with Mr Hudson. This week we’re exploring the inverted imbalance of supply and demand in travel that will hit in the next few months, and the changing definition of business travel.

I hate to disappoint, but I wasn’t actually “on the road” at all in the past two weeks. I’m not actually certain I left the island of Manhattan. But the influx of visitors coming back into the city means that people are coming to see me again. Hooray!

Topics this week: 

1) Why you should book your summer vacation right now (maybe yesterday)

2) Are fun offsites the new standard for business travel?

Where I’ve been: 

Nowhere! And if that nowhere is New York, that’s fine by me.

What I’ve learned: 

The past two weeks in New York have been nothing short of an enormous turnaround. After a muted holiday season and early January where loads of European tourists were walking around wondering where everyone was, the last two weeks have seen restaurants turning away customers, hotels starting to feel buzzy again, and just a general sense that the city may be on a real road back to some semblance of normal life.

Now for the bad news.

Inflation has its eyes on your summer vacation

Summer 2022 is already full of predictions about how it’s going to compare to summer 2019. The Christmas holidays offered a preview of how grueling it will be for many people to land their favorite vacation spots. And for travelers that may have memories of Summer 2020 and 2021, when hotels around the world were at war to attract leisure travelers, this summer is shaping up to be an all-out war for leisure travelers. Yes, there have been false starts, but this time feels different.

When we hear a lot about exceptional rates of inflation across the U.S. and Europe in goods and services, we haven’t grown accustomed to seeing how rising prices will affect our vacation budget. So get ready to experience how all the dynamics (from staff shortages to supply problems) will make your 2022 summer vacation one of the most expensive yet.

Let’s examine the case of a friend of mine that I’ll call Alex, who asked me to have a look at her plans for a two-week, four-person family holiday in Spain and Italy. The challenge? Find an itinerary that could satisfy first-time travelers to two of Europe’s most visited countries, while making up for some of the lost glamor of home living and working over the past two years.

Key points include:

• Inflation
• Business travel
• Tourism

Read the full post, On the Road #3: Is travel ready for you?, on LinkedIn.