Move over London, luxury travelers have a new favourite city. Virtuoso, the global leader in luxury and experiential travel, has analyzed intel from its data warehouse exceeding $63.6 billion in transactions and found that while upscale globetrotters continue to book eternal European favourites, Paris has risen to the top as the number one city among luxury leisure travellers.
Paris is the most popular city for booking with Virtuoso agents. Leonard Cotte/Unsplash Photo
Surpassing both Rome and London, Paris is Virtuoso’s most booked European city in 2022 – a trend that Virtuoso hotel analytics shows continuing into 2023. While New York City was the most booked city overall in 2022 and is pacing 13 percent ahead of last year, Paris tops them all in 2023 and is currently pacing 96 percent ahead of 2022. Additionally, the number of trips booked to Paris in 2022 was 44 percent higher than in 2019, travel’s high-water mark.
Five U.S. cities made the list, including Miami, Las Vegas, and Santa Monica. Two Italian destinations are in the top ten.
Proving that money remains no object when it comes to luxury experiences, Paris is currently the most expensive travel option out of the top three European cities. On average, hotel rates in Paris have been 30 percent higher than in Rome and 21 percent higher than in London. Average daily rates for 2023 leisure travel bookings at Virtuoso hotels in Paris are 33 percent higher than in 2019, demonstrating the elegance and beauty of the world’s most romantic city are worth the price.
The world-famous Santa Monica Pier. JIM BYERS PHOTO
Top 10 Most Booked Cities for Leisure Travel in 2023 (to date):
- Paris
- London
- New York
- Las Vegas
- Nassau
- Rome
- Miami
- Santa Monica
- Washington, D.C.
- Venice
Booking analysis is based on transactional data sourced from Virtuoso’s travel agency members. For more information on travel to Paris, including connecting with a Virtuoso travel advisor who can translate travel dreams into reality, please visit www.virtuoso.com.
The Fairmont Chateau Laurier in Ottawa.
ACCOR HOTELS REBOUND STRONGLY
Accor Hotels, which includes Fairmont, Sofitel, Raffles, Novotel, Ibis and many other brands, say it’s hotels in most parts of the world did better in the second half of 2022 than they did before the pandemic.
“The performance of hotels over the second half of the year surpasses pre-crisis levels in almost all our regions,” the company said in a statement issued today. “Only Asia, a region impacted by China’s strict zero-Covid policy until year end, is still significantly below 2019 activity levels.
“Worldwide, our recovery was primarily driven by domestic guests, with levels exceeding those of 2019. Whereas international travellers, even whose number grows sharply, failed to return to the level of 2019. As observed in recent quarters, the recovery was led by a strong increase in prices, fueled by demand and accentuated by inflation,” said Sébastien Bazin, Accor’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.
In 2022, Accor opened 299 hotels, corresponding to 43,000 rooms, accounting in a net organic growth in the network of 3.2% over the 12-month period. At end-December 2022, the Group had a hotel portfolio of 802,269 rooms (5,445 hotels) and a pipeline of 216,000 rooms (1,247 hotels).
In 2022, the Accor Group recorded a revenue of €4,224 million ($6.06 billion CAD) , up 80% from 2021, officials said.
Consolidated Revenue Per Available Room (RevPAR) across the globe was up 15% during the fourth quarter of 2022, compared to the same period of 2019.
