LOS ANGELES — After four long years, it appears the coveted international visitor is finally returning to the United States in earnest.
The recovery was heralded by many destination marketers at the U.S. Travel Association's annual IPW conference here. But the good news was tempered by travel experts who said the recovery was piecemeal, with some regions benefiting more than others.
International travel to the entire United States is expected to reach 98% of 2019 levels this year, up from 84% in 2023, and is expected to fully recover next year. Some states are seeing early success. Visit Florida is one DMO that says it expects international visitor numbers to exceed pre-pandemic levels this year.
International arrivals to the Sunshine State increased by 1.7% in March compared to March 2019, surpassing 2019 numbers for the first time in the state. Dana Young, CEO of Visit Florida, said the market will recover this year “if they keep coming.”
Young said the markets driving the economic recovery were Germany, which was up 28% in March compared to 2019, and Britain, which was up 12%.
This is a similar trend at Universal Orlando Resort.
“We're very excited,” Heather Brown, Universal Orlando's senior vice president of destination marketing and sales, told IPW, noting the recovery from key markets, especially the United Kingdom and Brazil. “We are actually experiencing a remarkable recovery internationally.” “There was pent-up demand and a lot of competition. But we're very happy with the recovery.”
New York City expects total visitor numbers this year to reach 97% of 2019 levels, with an increase in international visitors, said Fred Dixon, CEO of New York City Tourism and Conventions. It said visitor numbers are expected to increase slightly and reach 98% of pre-pandemic levels.
“If current forecasts hold, and we expect them to, next year will be significantly higher than 2019 in all categories except business travel,” he said.
Mr Dixon said the international tourist sector was “important” to New York, accounting for 20 per cent of tourist levels but 50 per cent of spending and hotel nights. “It would take four domestic travelers to match the economic impact of one international traveler,” he said.
“What’s going well isn’t good enough.”
Jeff Freeman, CEO of US Travel, said the company has had some success in different destination markets.
He said some markets are above 2019 levels, but others are below, particularly those that rely on Asia from Seattle to San Diego.
“If you tell anyone on the West Coast what's going on in China or Japan, they'll tell you they're on the bottom,” Freeman said. “Obviously, compared to the situation in 2019, we are well behind the trend line and there is a lot of work to do. It is good to hear that some markets are doing well, but not enough markets are doing well. not.”
Mr Freeman said excessive wait times for visas in some countries also affected some destinations more than others. Teams that rely on Colombia, for example, are feeling the pinch.
Meanwhile, in India, where Freeman said there have been “huge” wait times for visas in past years, those wait times have been reduced from 150 to 200 days. “It's the only market we're seeing nationwide that currently has more visitors than it did before the pandemic,” he said. “The only reason for this is the huge demand to overcome visa hurdles.
“But it is not sustainable in the long term to put as many obstacles in front of travelers as possible and still have them come.”
India and Canada are the only two countries among the top 10 inbound markets to fully recover and reach or exceed pre-pandemic levels in 2023, National Travel and Tourism Authority data shows. is shown. With the exception of Japan and China, the remaining countries on the list are expected to recover next year and outperform 2019.
Los Angeles and China
Los Angeles is one market that is experiencing exactly the uneven recovery that Freeman alluded to. The number of international visitors to the city reached 7.4 million in 2019 and 5.8 million in 2023, lagging mainly behind markets in the Asia-Pacific region.
“The recovery is going to be gradual, and right now we're trying to be very nimble with our rollout strategy,” said Adam Burke, CEO of the Los Angeles Convention and Visitors Bureau. He said the organization still maintains all seven international offices but is focused on the visa-free market, where air services have returned to pre-pandemic levels.
That's because of the approximately 3.3 million Chinese people who visited the United States in 2019, 1.2 million visited Los Angeles. Last year, the city welcomed 400,000 Chinese tourists.
These numbers are expected to take several years to fully recover.
“This remains one of our top overseas markets, but that means we're also trying to backfill 800,000 visitors,” he said. “So the markets that we are really focused on are the UK, Ireland, Australia/New Zealand, South Korea, France, Japan and Germany, because air services have fully recovered in those markets.”
Getting a ticket and visa exemption status can make a difference. For example, visitor numbers to Los Angeles in the UK have nearly rebounded from 380,000 in 2019 to 310,000 last year, Burke said.
Despite the shortfall, Burke said he remains bullish on China. He mentioned several travel industry delegations heading to China over the next month, as well as agreements being finalized between the Los Angeles Tourism Authority, Visit California, and the Chinese travel industry.
“The recovery will still take some time, but we remain quite optimistic about how China will fare as a long-term market,” he said.
