Decoding Asia’s Shifting Travel & Lifestyle Landscape

A quick check of the calendar tells us there are just 11 weeks left of 2018… and counting. As Asia’s highly competitive travel and lifestyle sectors cautiously prepare for the uncertain backdrafts of a China-US trade war, possible currency fluctuations and jittery GDP announcements, Check-in Asia rewinds another eventful year of trends tracking.

How has Ctrip contributed to the Chinese Travel Revolution?

In 2018, we teamed up with EyeforTravel to produce a timely report charting the local, regional and global rise of Ctrip, China’s leading online travel agent which celebrates its 20th anniversary in 2019. An accompanying White Paper takes a broader look at China’s fast-changing online travel market, and assesses Ctrip’s cashed-up challengers, Meituan-Dianping, Fliggy and Tongcheng-Elong (which Ctrip part-owns alongside Tencent), the proliferation of activities-based booking platforms, and the prospects for Chinese travel should the value of the RMB weaken in 2019.

Does Macau’s new family-friendly focus open up the casino-tourism market for Cambodia and Japan?

Tourism is the mainstay of Macau’s economy, and casino gaming has been the primary revenue driver since 2004. A policy shift towards family and business-oriented tourism, however, means new destination marketing tactics are designed to entice more visitors from South East Asia, Japan and Korea, and reduce the reliance on visitors from Mainland China. Check-in Asia partnered with Mintel to track the tourism challenges faced by Macau, particularly as Cambodia and Japan target investors in the lucrative casino travel market.

How are brands and retailers responding to changing consumer aspirations in South East Asia?

Urban consumers across the 10 countries of ASEAN are embracing smart technologies, and expect brands and travel providers to constantly upgrade their service offerings. Each month, we round-up new innovations created to make travel, living and working more fun and more convenient in Thailand and Indonesia. Recent themes include revolutions in home-delivery, free bus rides in exchange for used plastics, low-altitude drone taxi tests and concerns over a digital citizen database. Travel-inspired observations range from the coastal marine trash overload and photo-shaming visitors who post social media images disrespecting the spiritual significance of ancient ruins to a rumoured CIA ‘Black Site’ that is now a historic tourism attraction.

What are the next “Big Things” in Asian tourism and lifestyle?

With aspirational Asian travellers likely to continue driving change across the tourism industry, we are fine-tuning our upcoming 2019 report. In the meantime, here’s a rewind of the 2018 Top 10 Asian Travel Trends, published in December 2017, which sifted through the segments and sectors we thought would dominate the travel landscape.

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