Travel businesses are missing out on a potential windfall by failing to target older travellers and instead choosing to focus their marketing efforts on younger age groups who have less money and time to spend on holidays.
This is one of the major findings of a report on the travel trends of the over-50s by the website Silver Travel Advisor, which offers reviews, information and advice to this age group, who they have dubbed “Silver Travellers”.
The report found that 75% of travel firms had no plans to offer holidays and services aimed at the over-50s despite this age group spending an estimated £37 billion on trips during 2014. Travel companies only spent 5% of their marketing budget on targeting over-50s.
Debbie Marshall, managing director of Silver Travel Advisor, says travel companies are missing out on a potential £16 billion per year in bookings by failing to specifically target the over-50s market, and choosing instead to focus on the 34-44 age group.
She says that the “grey pound” accounted for 54% of travel spending in the UK in 2012 – up from a 46% market share 10 years earlier. This is perhaps not surprising given that the over-50s now hold about 80% of the UK’s wealth, which is estimated at around £9 trillion.
It’s also a demographic that is only going to grow in importance in the next 25 years. The current 22.8 million people aged over 50 will grow to 31 million by 2040, when they will have an estimated total household spend of £480 billion per year.
Over-50s already have the highest disposable income of any age group and they potentially have even more money to spend now that they can cash in their pension pots following changes to pension laws in April 2015.
