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ASTA | introduction
INDUSTRY ANALYSIS The disappearance of off-season travel
Travelers have long made a sport of avoiding school breaks to score deals. But as more folks opt for this method amid growing work flexibility, off-peak prices have soared. By Ross Kenneth Urken
Off-season travel may become obsolete
Everyone’s doing it — searching for hotel deals over hidden weekends somewhere between Presidents’ Day and Easter. Globe-trotters are working with travel advisors and scouring Google Flights and SkyScanner to unlock the secret ultra-low airfare that’s just out of sight, findable somewhere and a total bargain compared to those sky-high Spring Break prices or bank-breaking, school’s-out-for-the- summer fares that make you actually consider swimming to Europe. Surely, shoulder-season steals will appear if they refresh their browser just one last time, put another call in to their code-cracking travel advisor, book on a Tuesday. Anything! More and more, what was a no-brainer
— snagging bargain-basement travel prices at times when demand is low — is proving
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challenging. Why? Travelers are playing Tetris with their calendars amid the rise of remote work, schedulistic flexibility and pent-up demand. As a result, something is off about the so-called off season. Put another way, travel is simply always on. Try fighting the calendar and it might as well be City Hall.
Seeing Off the Off Season Some say the off season is an entirely obsolete concept. “An off season really doesn’t exist anymore,” says Kasra Moshkani, executive vice president at CLEAR Verified, the secure- identity company known for CLEAR Plus, its signature airport membership. “Recent travel has surpassed even our most bullish expectations, and every day now feels like the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.”
The pandemic shifted the typical demand
dynamic amid people’s ability to move around their travel dates. “With more people working remotely and in
hybrid work environments, travelers are leaving earlier and staying longer at their destinations to beat ‘holiday prices’ and spend more time with their families and friends,” Moshkani adds. But if everyone knows flights and hotels
in particular destinations are more expensive during summer and school holidays, then travelers with more flexibility have gotten wise to moving their dates in search of deals. So if everyone’s doing it, the demand in the so-called off season is also high, thus driving costs higher. There’s something of a Yogi Berra restaurant logic to the scenario in travel dynamics: “Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.”
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