by Rising taxes, persistently high mortgage interest, eye recording costs and the inflation shock put a strain on our identity power. In the meantime, the costs for flights and foreign holidays continue to increase, especially during the school holidays. A return air food for Corfu can now cost over 1,300 GBP, and a recent report? It found that the holiday holiday prices in 2025 have increased over the entire inflation rate in Great Britain for seven out of ten popular destinations since last year.
The price increases in traditional favorites of mid-range in particular Italy, Portugal and Cyprus goods the steepest of all. According to the consumer organization, the average costs for a seven-night package holiday, including flights, have three times the inflation rate by 7.4 percent in the first week of August with a large tour operator in Italy.
It is a double stroke of strings and rising prices that were intuitively a survey by YouGov last November last November that despite these challenges, the number of British who took over -sea vacation had actually occurred between 2023 and 2024. So what’s going on? Do we prioritize our holidays at costs to achieve other savings elsewhere, or are the country’s economic problems are a illustrator?
In fact, this slight increase in bookings masked a different demographic trend. Younger people (mainly between the ages of 18 and 34) take significantly more public holidays than before, while families and older vacationers travel less – most of them cite the increasing lifestyle and affordability problems as the reason for the cuts.
It feels like a further confirmation of a current telegraph report in which a new category of economic stress was determined in Great Britain: the bourgeois class “poor”. These are people in the salaries of the middle class (defined by the ONS with around 30,000 to 60,000 pounds per year), which can no longer afford the lifestyle they had expected. According to the Financial Fairness Trust (FFT), around 20 percent of this contingent have “difficulties to afford food and essential”, while many other savings or debts apply. The holidays will certainly fall on the list of priorities.
Interestingly, the effects of this squeeze are not only less on vacation costs in the middle classes to travel less. It affects where people stay and when they disappear. There is growing evidence that British travelers with limited budgets are brought into the season outside of the season outside of the season. I reported this trend for bookings on long -distance destinations last year, and it also seems to be the case for short breaks in Europe.
Kirker Travel says that the bookings for important destinations in Italy rose by 30 to 40 percent between January and March of this year. And in Venice in January last January, several smaller high -quality hotels, who were popular with demanding British tourists, told me completely booked in the winter months. In the meantime, their larger, more expensive competitors were either closed until the carnival season or indicated discounts, which indicated that they had difficulty selling their rooms.
This withdrawal to cheaper accommodations and the booking outside of the season certainly has an impact on the growing pressure on the most important goals in Europe. In spring we not only have to compete with our European neighbors, but also with the resuscitation of tourists from Asia and Australasia and in particular with the growing numbers from America. The figures that rose to over 20 million to Europe between 2022 and 2023 (last year, for which numbers are available) rose by 30 percent. That is seven million more than the number of Europeans who went to the United States.
You have enormous purchasing power. The average salary after taxes in the United States is 40 percent more than here in Great Britain (£ 40,000 compared to around 28,450 GBP). And those Americans who choose vacation abroad are much richer than the average. In 2023, the average household income for Americans who had overseas was $ 154,000 (120,000 GBP).
The Americans not only have a lot more cash, they also enjoyed a stronger dollar, which means that prices in Europe look even lower for them. The US currency reached parity with the euro at the end of January and although it has fallen a little back since then, it is still ten percent higher than at the end of 2020.
It is not surprising that there are clear signs that Americans draw on our traditional holiday lawn, especially on the top market. According to Luxury Villa Special Simpson Travel, the bookings from the USA are growing – it now has a special American website with dollar prices and a local American phone number. Another upscale Villa company, Scott Williams, said that this year it has increased to an increase in inquiries from the Atlantic. The cultural-touring specialist Martin Randall-Die based in Great Britain are most of the continental Europe, said that it was 8 percent in bookings from the United States compared to the previous year (as well as a breathtaking increase of 39 percent Australia and New Zealand).
In the meantime, the cost of a stay in one of the classic Grand Hotels in Europe was distorted. I remember that in the nineties in a very modest salary was booked for a night in a floating room suite in the Savoy Hotel in London. I paid about £ 150 – certainly expensive, but affordable as a special pleasure (in this case it was my wedding night). Today the same room costs almost 3,000 pounds. I’m much better now than then, but I would never dream of going out so much – even for a second honeymoon.
On the whole, even a relatively modest room in one of the top hotels in London, Paris, New York, Venice or Rome now often costs £ 1,000 per night. The standards have increased, but the room rates have disproportionately shaken. Of course, this is not only because of American money – these hotels are the top choice of the super rich from all over the world, from the Middle East to China and Brazil.
We have had it well in Great Britain for decades. But slowly and safely, it seems that – and especially those of us in the pressed middle – are directed towards the edges of the traveling world.
