Tech, Travel, and Twang!
Come for the thoughts, stay for the tea. The co-founders of Destination Innovate, Jennifer Barbee and Kristen Cruz brew up the latest industry tea every Tuesday - diving into simmering issues, hot trends, and special guests. Grab a cup and let’s spill the tea!
Tech, Travel, and Twang!
Tuesday Tea Ep. #4 | Evolving Travel Trends: From Quiet Getaways to Viral Ads
Can a tourism commercial make you laugh out loud and book a flight? Tune into this episode of Tech Travel and Twang where Jenn and Kristen are back with their Tuesday Tea segment, sharing weekend updates and diving into the latest buzz in travel and design. Jenn’s been busy with her upcycling and interior design projects and Kristen reminisces about Jenn's ever evolving passion for transforming spaces. Then we get down to it, chatting about a hilarious and clever tourism ad from Oslo that's gone viral, showcasing the power of unique destination marketing and the growing trend of anti-brand strategies.
Curious about the rising "quiet life" travel trend? We explore how this new preference for calm, stress-free vacations is taking over, especially on platforms like Pinterest. Destinations are shifting gears to offer more relaxed, introspective experiences, catering to travelers who crave a break from the chaos of highly-scheduled trips. We'll also touch on niche travel trends like astro tourism and the necessity of creating inspiration-driven content that guides travelers without overwhelming them.
Finally, we delve into the evolving travel habits of Gen Z. With economic factors and inflation leading to a preference for road trips over flying, young travelers are prioritizing experiences over homeownership. Remote work is also changing the game, allowing for longer weekend getaways. Plus, we discuss quirky trends like pop-culture-inspired refrigerator interiors and the fascinating potential for creative collaborations with consumer packaged goods. Join us for a lively discussion as we look ahead to fall holiday plans and new travel opportunities!
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The Tech, Travel, and Twang Podcast is hosted by Co-Founders, Kristen Cruz and Jenn Barbee with Destination Innovate. Learn More! https://destinationinnovate.com/about/
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Well, hey there, welcome back to Tech Travel and Twang with our Tuesday Tea. I'm Jen Barbie with my co-host, Kristen Cruz. Good morning Kristen, Good morning Jen. How was the start of your week?
Speaker 2:How was your weekend? Well, it's officially July, so that's fun. The very middle of the hottest, one of the hottest summers Well, we can't really say that anymore. Hottest summers on record. It really isn't a thing, it's just hot in the summer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but weekend was good. How was yours? My weekend was good. I did a little background office rearranging so you know, every now and then the kids are about to go back to school because over here in Arizona they start July 17th, which is crazy. So this is back to school month for us. So a little little spring cleaning, summer cleaning, preschool cleaning. I decided to do a little refreshing. So my weekend was great. A little sore because mama doesn't usually do that much activity, but it feels great. It's kind of like the first day of school with my new setup too. Right.
Speaker 2:I love that feeling, that house refresh feeling, where you're sitting in a clean house and everything smells good and things are where they're supposed to be, because you know it's for a very limited time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I'm a big upcycler too. Like everything I did to rearrange, like even my wallpaper back here is upcycled from a strip I use someplace else, from the strip I used someplace else. Like it was just fun to kind of hunt through the house and find little treasures to put together this and, you know, refresh the kids' room. So that was fun. But then again, you know, I loved doing the interior design stuff.
Speaker 2:I know I remember so many years ago coming over to your house and you were always in the middle of some insane project Like I'm going to cover all of these couches with this new fabric I just bought. I bought a hundred thousand yards of this fabric and you would literally like turn couches over and like refabric and get your that's when design shows started coming on TV. About the time I got my own like out of my own that Trudy Macy's show I think was on at that time, christopher.
Speaker 1:Lowell, christopher Lowell, the Seven Principles of Design. Come on, yes.
Speaker 2:Oh, my goodness. It's so funny because I remember, during that time frame too, I bought this. I thought I was the coolest person ever because I had bought this huge HGTV design book which I still have, by the way, somewhere in this house, anyway and several years later I looked at it again. I'm like what were we thinking?
Speaker 1:We put too much in there. The principal law book says you only need 18 inches to pass through a room. I did that and Drew would have to like sideways through the room because I had the furniture so close. But yeah, no, it's fun every day. I don't do that so often anymore, but it's a lot of fun every now and then. So I was like in the girls room what's your vibe like? How do you want to feel when you go to sleep or work? So I don't want to say it's feng shui. We jinshued the rooms just based on how they want to use them from a utilitarian standpoint too well that, and I feel like it's like a refresh for creative space you know, like just you have this like new space, new vibe, and it's like, okay, I'm thinking differently, I have new ideas that I didn't have.
Speaker 2:Like it does create some real creativity when you're in a new space like that, absolutely.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Talking about new ideas. Did you watch that commercial for Oslo I sent to you? I did.
Speaker 2:I thought it was obviously very brilliant in the way they put it together. But it's very like, quietly brilliant. Like at first you're like what are they trying to tell me? Like, what are and also what is this about? You know, like you have to ease into it. And then you realize, especially like with our profession, I think we probably quickly realized what it was doing.
Speaker 1:But yes, that's very dry European humor, though Like it is a slow burn.
Speaker 2:And they and people say that they're not like funny, like I was like laughing my butt off. I'm like this is especially Reese talking about like the cultural side of it, and there's like this, like in the Mona Lisa and whatnot, and there's like this like incredible, like isn't that the one of the most historic paintings? Like right behind, yeah, he's like nothing on elisa but for those listening, maybe just not knowing.
Speaker 1:so it just went viral as a tourism oslo did a commercial which is basically one of the kind of follows our trend on this whole anti-brand, nothing to see here, no reason to come here. And it was really smart because and they took a local person like 31 years years old and he's talking about I grew up here, I'm temporarily living here.
Speaker 1:I don't know why people would come. You know, it's very, like I said dry humor but very smart. So it went viral and now there's a huge spike in Google searches for where is Oslo? Because obviously, you know, we don't know our geography very well over here, right?
Speaker 2:Well, there's so many and there's so many countries and whatnot. There's a net in front of my face, so many countries over there that are sort of jam packed. A lot of like popular destinations are very close to one another, whereas we sometimes obviously over here, like we're we're sparse down a bit. But yeah, I thought that was it. There's very much a pattern to what we're seeingarsed out a bit, but yeah, I thought that was. There's very much a pattern to what we're seeing destinations tapping into.
Speaker 2:And for a lot of them I feel like, especially the ones that are sort of stuck in this very long lived perception of what their destination is and who's there and what the vibe is like, it's hard to climb out of that without addressing it. First, you kind of have to, because then it just looks like catfished marketing efforts. You know what I'm saying? Like we all know that that's not what that looks like, or we all know that that's not the vibe, but at the same time we don't know, because a lot of us who assume have never been there and so there's a lot of work to be done, to assume have never been there and so there's a lot of work to be done, and this whole anti-brand, anti-tourism vibe is it feels like it's working, like it feels like there's a lot of influx in those destinations that have played around with this over the last couple of years and are seeing some, especially in the media, like the media has really, I do think it pays off, like you said.
Speaker 1:I'm glad you mentioned the catfishing thing because if you do an anti-brand, that has to still be a true statement right, that still has to be a current, preconceived notion. Uh, you know, we talked about vegas a few episodes back, but if you think about them they're like the originator of the anti-brand. They went even further, like if we're going to be sin city, we're going to be Sin City, we're going to be Sin City. So that even like affected their destination development. So I'm curious to see how these anti-brand brand campaigns, which are really just communication campaigns, how those are going to affect the product Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly, and also some of the um, some of the ways in which those that are living, like your actual residents, and those that live and work in those destinations, how that changes their perception, um, of how they're interacting with new visitors coming in, expecting you know like, and again, first time, like this this increases your first timers by an enormous amount of those that have never even visited um, and so what does that interaction look like? It just, it's definitely, it's definitely something to keep an eye on, um and kind of see how that resonates and what that does for those destinations.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, we know the path to you visit once, especially if something was like. We really love to think that we've discovered something. Maybe other people have it. So there's that part of it too, like I'm going there that first time If I have a good time. Now I know a secret. Now I have my little secret place. I might tell my friends, but I have some ownership in that tourism brand. Yep.
Speaker 2:I can see that.
Speaker 1:I love it. I think they're brilliant.
Speaker 2:More anti-brands, let's go yes, and they're so fun to like. Just, you know, just in the ways that they get to be creative is really fun. Um, one thing I saw last week too, too, that I thought was was really interesting, was on Pinterest, which I've gotten back with doing more of like my little. I'm in my little home project phase again where I'm trying to dabble projects around the house and all my spare time. I've been back on Pinterest and I noticed in some of the content that I was getting served up and then saw this again and one of my trending when I get like all the trending news and whatnot that the quiet life, like the more calm travel and the quote-unquote quiet life type travel, is really trending again on Pinterest.
Speaker 2:I think for those of us who and just kind of thinking about it from my perspective too like one of the things that we saw was the July 4th travel increase and the way that it falls this year obviously is part of that because it falls on a Thursday, so people are naturally going to take Friday and we're going to make it a long weekend. Yeah, let's go somewhere, right, but for those that need like, I don't want to go someplace for my holiday weekend, I want to stay where I'm at. I want the quiet, calmness of a relaxing long weekend. There's a lot of that now. That's extremely popular and very much needed. Because of the rise on these holiday weekends, it's going to be a record travel weekend.
Speaker 2:That does not sound appealing to me. So, anyway, I saw that on Pinterest and thought about how that, how that pertains to some of the summer travel and some of the campaigns and things that we're seeing kind of coming out and feeling like destinations need to be jumping on this bandwagon again and really pulling in things from their destinations that produce a more quieter trip. Like still come, stay, but stay right. Like enjoy these things that are in more of a quiet space. You know the over tourism is huge in the media again like places in Europe that people typically would want to travel to. It's like don't come, there's already too much, there's too much going on, plan that for later, but there's a lot of domestic destinations here in the US that could really take advantage. I feel like and I didn't see much it was more like there's more demand and less destinations talking about.
Speaker 1:I think that is it domestically, like there is the demand there and destinations. I don't think they've quite gotten their mind around these niche uprisings because they come so fast. I was talking to a DMO from the Northeast last week too, and she had not really heard of astro tourism.
Speaker 1:You, you know like going where there's not sky pollution to be able to actually see the stars, like there are a lot of these. I don't think they know exactly like what to do and how to move those along, because they're not tour operators, they're destinations. So patching packaging it there's still that like gap of packaging and experience versus what you can do as a destination.
Speaker 2:Right, but yeah, I'm glad you like well I was going to say too, like we say, every place is a destination, right, like, every place within your destination is also a destination right, right.
Speaker 1:Think about. Think about tourism. Like your gps, if you're going, so we're going to the grocery store, that's your destination, and what's that destination experience look like?
Speaker 2:Especially for those of us that don't want to go a bunch of places. Like I used to be such a different traveler. I feel like I used to want to. I used to need a schedule. I used to need to have things planned out, know where I was going to be. Did we get tickets ahead of time? You know, do we need to get there early, like just have a game plan?
Speaker 2:And then you came back and needed a vacation from your vacation, didn't you Absolutely Like that whole chapter of my life? I feel like I needed a vacation, and so I was like I can't be this structured like schedule mom anymore. Like I have to just like let some of that go because I'm going to drive myself crazy and also I was not enjoying my experiences. Like it's not a joyous feeling when you're constantly referring to an itinerary or stressing about how that experience is going to go because you didn't plan it good enough. So yeah, there's I feel like there's a huge generation of us that are like I don't want to follow that schedule, I don't want to have that itinerary. I want to know that I'm going to go someplace that has these things for me to do, but I want this experience. I don't want a series of experiences, I want to really focus on.
Speaker 1:I wonder if we're, if we're not allowing then some of that planning or that discovery time for our travelers, where I know too, from from a content perspective, like that is crank out another itinerary, crank out another blog, crank out. Another thing is that contributing to the stress of coming to that destination instead of actually helping well, I think you have to think about it in two ways.
Speaker 2:Like you still, you still have your itinerary groups right. You still have your visitors who are like give me ideas of things to do and also map out what, my what, what you know kind of those that go into the destination and they're at a restaurant, right, and they're like okay, well, what should I order? Well, what's, what's, what's the best thing? You tell me, Like you give me an idea and I'm going to order that thing. Those guys want they want to be served that itinerary because they want to experience the destination in the best way possible and they feel like you were the resource, right. So you tell me what I should be doing. But you also have those of us who don't necessarily. Maybe an idea or two, not necessarily in an itinerary format, but here's the types of- Inspiration yeah, yeah, more inspo than anything. That way it's in more detail, like if I could go to one place and I could spend an entire afternoon or even an entire day in that one place, because there's all of these things to choose from.
Speaker 1:I'd rather go there than go to four different places with four different experiences, just because it seems less stressful for me I think that's's why you know, of course, obviously like a, why Disney does so well, but also like down to the reality of destination by destination. Those mixed use retails do so well, they do so well, and that's why downtowns, I think, are doing doing a lot better.
Speaker 2:Now you could just walk through a downtown and you can, like you happen upon a record story, you happen upon this cute little vintage bookstore, you happen upon this little like mom and pop shop that you know where you're the only one shopping and you have this like one to one experience with the owner and you get to hear about some of the like that that, I feel like, is that's the quiet travel right. Like I just want to go and just be with myself and explore and not necessarily be outdoors climbing mountains, you know what I mean. Like there's a different but it's definitely on the rise. Like this is a, this is a big thing, and I think that's going to lead into the fall and holiday travel too.
Speaker 1:No, I think so. I mean honestly. Let's just be real honest about our stress levels and our whatever. And one of the things I'd written down was I don't know if you heard this or not, but the $5 meal deal is the new dollar menu.
Speaker 2:Like burgers in a bag at Brahms, which I can't stand, you can? I have to just say this really quick because this is the most disgusting thing. So Brahms has this thing where you can buy a bag of burgers Okay, and it's on the menu, bag of burgers and I'm like who goes and buys just a bag of burgers? It sounds like the most disgusting thing in the world. But anyways, carry on.
Speaker 2:I imagine Bubba's taking them back and freezing those suckers. I'm just like unsure. Why is that a mini thing, or why is that appealing to anybody, and why put it on the marquee like that is your marquee item is the bag of burgers.
Speaker 1:I don't get it so we digress anyway off of what you're saying about like where we're going, mindset, travel, wise. You know, I know we I think we discussed this a little bit last week but TripAdvisor is opening up a lot of their advertising components to CPG companies because really travel is now like a state of mind in people. It's not like when they're constantly looking at travel, constantly planning their next trip, constantly dreaming of the next thing. So those consumer product goods are saying how do we get in front of travelers? Because also travelers are happier. They 46 percent of them recall advertising versus 26 percent in non travelers Like it is really that travel state of mind is a joyful, peaceful state of mind. Now everybody else wants in on it.
Speaker 2:It is. And also I think and there was a study done on this but there was a huge percentage of difference between the happiness and the stress levels of people who had a trip planned, like on at some point in the near future had a trip planned, and those that did not, and those that had something to look forward to vacation or trip wise, even if it was a short trip, were a lot less stressed and a lot happier people. And so when we go on a like a trip, like it may be a long weekend or whatever, but I'm looking at what the next place is while I'm on that trip, Like I'm already like, hey, this is fun. What if we did this?
Speaker 2:That sounds like an extra stress level too though, because, well, one travel's inspiring right, like it inspires you to be like, oh, it would be fun to do this next time, you know, since we did this this time, or whatever, but it is that there is a serious checkbox in my brain, for sure, where, if I have something anticipated, like something to look forward to travel wise, I am just a much better person in general. I'm much happier, much more productive.
Speaker 2:I'm better to be around, you know, and I think that's that way for a lot of people. It's just. It puts you in that state of mind like right, like you feel like you have something to look forward to, but you have an experience that you're anticipating, that you haven't done before, or maybe you have, but you're into it differently and that's just a state of mind that I think is very joyful for people.
Speaker 1:Well, I think too. I think people are also like, just from a fiscal standpoint, right they're. They're continuing to want to invest in experiences, especially as we get younger the generations as experiences mean more.
Speaker 1:Because they don't own a damn home, it doesn't look like they might ever like you know, the home body corner of it also is shifting, like we just have to live life wherever we can and get the joy we can. And I think that's where you know the younger, the Gen Z's, are taking five and six trips minimum a year. They're spending 30% of their income on travel. That's a priority. That's like house budget, it is.
Speaker 2:It really is. But I did see something else. I did see trend wise was that Travel Age put out a study that said travelers are wanting to well, they're preferring driving over flying. Like we're back in that where the majority of us, as a us this is us stats um we prefer to drive over fly. But secondary to that, it's because travelers want to keep traveling, so they have to cut budget somewhere right to keep doing the amount of travel they want to do with the inflation and economic uncertainty and all the things that we're dealing with right now as a nation. So they're driving instead of flying because ultimately it's cheaper.
Speaker 2:You know, gas isn't insanely crazy right now. I'm sure it will be by the end of summer. But they're also willing to risk a few things. They want to spend more on experiences, but they're going to that journey from point A to point B. They're willing to just get let's get in the car and drive so we can have money when we get there right, we have income when we get there to really do that travel, do that experience. And so they're willing to cut some corners. It's looking like and that's it again with inflation and just what we look like now compared to even 21, 22,. I have seen so many of these content creators doing things like purchasing the exact same shopping cart of groceries, right, did you see?
Speaker 1:that.
Speaker 2:I saw that this weekend it was like 120 and now it's 414 the same and it's so true I went back and I was like wait, let me go back to my like kroger pickup app and I would like do that. And I'm like omg, just two years difference, um, and this I mean it's summer. We got kids at home. Food is expensive, like let's drive, let's just go somewhere.
Speaker 1:So that is what people are thinking about right now I'm thinking too with the road trip versus air travel too. You're more connected, so I wonder how many of this are affected by people taking quiet vacations and not time off of work. But we are getting it in Right. So if you're driving, you've got a little more control over. Okay, I need to do my meetings, I need to do whatever, cause I think people are. They're getting it in, but this summer it's also. They're trying to keep up with their business, keep up with their work and get the vacation in and the work in.
Speaker 2:Absolutely yeah, and I think that was attributed to, like some of the July 4th stats, was because we're we are such a remote civilization at this point. It did impact the long weekend travel. I mean, that's why we're at a record number of people going for a long weekend because they can't, you know, you're not stuck to an office and having to go back to an office on Friday yeah, and a long weekend is not like a Friday, saturday, sunday anymore, because I saw this too this weekend.
Speaker 1:It was like why have weekends now become the 30 minute lunch break? Right, right, because it's just over with. So you know, a three day really is more like a. You know, if you really wanted more like a four day now.
Speaker 2:So a Thursday Friday.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because you got to get to wherever going and you got to get home, right. So. But it is definitely following all the patterns that we've been speaking to and hearing, which is we're all willing to take longer If we can get, if we can get ahead of them, longer weekends in lieu of a week or two vacation, and a lot of us have trouble taking it's really difficult to get away for a week or two weeks, you know, and and not get crazy behind where you come back and you need a vacation from your vacation. So give me all the long weekends for sure, for sure.
Speaker 1:Um, so on our tea part. Uh, did you also see speaking of like pop culture and affecting people's homes? Did you see people are paying people to stylize the inside of their refrigerators, like bridgerton wait what that's my random pop culture of today are literally taking everything out of their refrigerator. They're buying fancy antiques, they're recanting their milk, they're putting blueberries open in like little bowls in their fridge and they have. They have picture frames with like ancestors in there.
Speaker 2:It's a whole thing. I have not seen that. Now I follow this like crazy organization group of people who organize, like do a really good job organizing their fridges and like everything's like stylized from that perspective. But I had not seen the Bridgerton trends. Who wait? But why, though? Like, why yeah?
Speaker 1:that's insane. It is, and I can't imagine first off, your food's all going to spoil really damn fast because it's not actually closed or canted. Uh, just seems. It seems silly, but yeah, that's a whole little viral uh trend going on.
Speaker 2:Tiktok is, you know, redesigning your inside of your refrigerator I have long, long long wanted to redesign the inside of my refrigerator just from a cleanliness organization standpoint, but I have put that out until I have no more kids in the house, because every time I try to do something organizationally in there it just gets screwed up like half a string cheese back in the fridge, like in the world.
Speaker 2:Or like stuff never goes back where it came from. It's like, let me get this milk out and let me pour. Oh, let me put this back in the fridge. Or like stuff never goes back where it came from. It's like, let me get this milk out and let me pour. Oh, let me put this back in a completely different spot, or you know, same with like fruit. It's just a mess. So no, I'm not even going to attempt that for the next. I'll probably wait another five, 10 years.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm good. I'm good with that too. My interior design bug does not extend to the inside of the refrigerator, or the inside of the cabinets, or the inside of the dishwasher. Whatever happened to there, I don't know, only what can be seen.
Speaker 2:This is exactly like what I tell Alicia when she's cleaning her room. I'm like your trend is you only clean the things that can be seen. If I can't see it, inside of drawers, cabinets, your closet, under your bed, it's not going to be clean. This is just what we know Only cleaning things that are visible to the eye when you walk in, like, oh, that looks great.
Speaker 1:That's funny. That's funny, but no, yeah, the 4th of July is supposed to be the largest in history, also long line, I mean, maybe a frustrating one too for people. Maybe some long lines may have to have some patience. But you got a long weekend four days and it, yeah, and it is the summer.
Speaker 2:I mean this is also our summer on record, like our boom travel summer. Um, they are saying that a lot of these same studies are saying that people are staying closer to home, like they're not traveling as far, obviously, because we know that it's longer weekends and they can't stay. I mean, you're not going to, you're not going to travel across the country for a long weekend.
Speaker 2:You're not doing that and obviously the cost that that associate with going further from home. But yeah, but it still is is it's crazy that we're again cutting corners but we're still hitting record numbers?
Speaker 1:yeah. Yeah, that's crazy, but I think it's going to be a really good summer of travel, but also, like I'm already thinking about fall, I mean the fall oh yeah, christmas in in July thing is already out Like I would really be thinking about, you know, fall and holidays at this point.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I and I feel like a lot of us are there because it's such a summer has become such a brutal season, weather wise, like we go straight from spring tsunami, tornado weather into 100 plus degrees of heat and just oven temperatures here and it's just, it's exhausting like nobody wants to be in that oh, it's gonna be cool here.
Speaker 1:Today we're only a high of 103, that's like. That's like a bright school for y'all.
Speaker 2:I think we're going to probably hit. Well, we'll be in the 100s today, but it's just no. But summer travel, yeah. So where can we go? That's cooler, essentially, and planning for fall and holiday. Because of the temperatures and where we're at in the summer, like as cities and destinations, your fall and your holiday content should already be on point ready to go yes, ready to go, accessible.
Speaker 2:Um, all your fall events, your holiday events and things that you know are coming back and you have details. Get them on the radar, get them on the calendars, because people are using that. Um, you know, plan further and further ahead for sure, for sure, awesome.
Speaker 1:So for uh, wrapping up our tuesday tea plan for the fall holidays, take a look at the anti-brands that are going out there. See if that makes sense for you guys, especially if you've got some preconceived notions about your brand, leaning in can really help. Fourth of july travel being huge, travel state of mind is really kind of where people are now, so that's also another good opportunity. We didn't hit on it, but I think it's also a good opportunity to think about. As trip advisor is bringing in cpgs, destinations should really be looking at products that align with their brand, their vibe and their visitors as partners and extra potential funding options.
Speaker 2:That's great, especially for people that have podcasts, like that's a great. Like put your associated products somehow in your podcast. Like find ways to collaborate. There's so much opportunity.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, absolutely Well, have a great week, kristen, and we'll uh, we'll spill the tea next Tuesday after the holiday.
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