It’s surprising, yet not, that people from different demographics travel differently and have different thoughts about travel and travelers.
- Liberals travel differently from conservatives
- Unvaccinated people go to different places than the vaccinated do
- Everyone has an opinion on who the worst behaved travelers in the world are
So is it the least bit surprising that people from different parts of the U.S. have different travel habits?
That’s especially true when you take into consideration the current situation when it comes to travel. Covid and how it’s affected peoples’ work AND leisure all come into play. So how, when, and what Americans search for travel has changed over the past year and change.
To better understand these shifting preferences, KAYAK analyzed search queries people used on their site during a specific time frame to determine how travel search behavior has evolved in each state – and how it’s changed since Covid.
With that information, they were able to determine which state searched least/most often for early morning flights, for business travel, for staycations, etc. Overall, it’s a very interesting look at how we, as a country, look at travel.
- Digital Nomads: Alaskans had the most amount of searches for long term stays (15%)
- Homebodies: Texans had the least amount of searches for long term stays (3%)
- In-State Explorers: California had the most amount of car searches in the same state as the searcher’s location (37%)
- Out-of-State Explorers: Kentucky had the least amount of car searches in the same state as the searcher’s location (8%)
- Staycationers: Florida had the most amount of searches within its own state (70%)
- Wanderers: West Virginia had the least amount of searches for staycation (11%)
- Most Ready to Travel: Louisiana had the biggest increase in flight searches (38%) from pre-COVID to now
- Most Reluctant to Travel: Maryland saw the biggest decrease in searches (-15%) from pre-COVID to now
- Deal Hunters: Mississippi had the biggest increase of vacation package searches (54%) pre-COVID to now
- A La Carte Travelers: Maine had the biggest decrease of vacation package searches (-30%) pre-COVID to now
- Early Birds: Montana had the largest amount of early (pre-7am) take off flight searches (3%)
- Most Likely to Sleep In: Ohio had the least amount of early take off flight searches (.3%)
- Procrastinators: Nevada had the most last minute flight searches (36%)
- Planners: Vermont had the least last minute flight searches (23%)
- Workaholics: New York had the highest number of signups for KAYAK for Business (9%)
- Vacation Seekers: South Dakota had the lowest number of signups for KAYAK for Business (.09%)
- Bougiest: Rhode Island had the most amount of searches for business class and first class flights (4%)
- Most Frugal: Nebraska had the least amount of business class and first class searches (1%)
- Searchin’ 9 to 5: Washington, D.C. had the most amount of flight searches during work hours (54%)
- After Hour Searchers: Oregon had the least amount of flight searches during work hours (44%)
From KAYAK:
For this year’s Travel Awards, we created a new kind of story: KAYAK’s first-ever “State Superlatives.” As the world’s leading travel search engine, we analyzed billions of search queries to determine how travel search behavior has evolved from state to state across the country. With this information, we gave each search behavior a superlative – yes, like straight out of a high school yearbook – and plotted it on our map.
Their methodology:
“Unless otherwise stated, KAYAK US searches were considered by state using searcher IP addresses to determine origin for search dates 3/1/2020 – 7/31/2021 (COVID-era) for all future travel dates. For comparison data showing pre-COVID vs COVID search dates change, search dates 7/1/2019 – 2/28/2020 (pre-COVID era) were used.
“The Ready to Travel & The Reluctant to Travel.Coach flight searches to all destinations were considered for pre-COVID vs COVID search dates for all future travel dates to determine the change in searches by state.
The Procrastinators & The Planners.Coach flight searches to all destinations were considered for searches that took place 14 days or less from the date of travel.
Searchin’ 9 to 5 & After-Hour Searchers.Coach flight searches during business hours (9am-5pm local time, Monday-Friday) to all destinations were considered.
The Bougiest & Most Frugal.First class and business class flight searches to all destinations were considered.
Staycationers & Wanderers.Stays searches in the same state as the user’s origin were considered.
In-State Explorers & Out-Of-State Explorers.Rental car searches in the same state as the user’s origin were considered.
The Digital Nomads & Homebodies.Stays searches for all destinations were considered and sorted by longest average stays search by origin state.
The Deal Hunters & The A La Carte Travelers.Total number of package searches were considered.
The Early Birds & Most Likely to Sleep In.Coach flight searches to all destinations were considered for searches that took place before 7am local time.
The Workaholics & The Vacation Seekers.Total number of companies by state that have signed up for KAYAK for Business in the past 90 days were considered.”
Feature Image: Pixabay
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This post first appeared on Your Mileage May Vary
