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The Expert in Baby Boomer Travel

Travel Copywriter

baby boomers and tourism

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A Generator Hostel in Berlin. Photo from Generator Hostels.

A Generator Hostel in Berlin. Photo from Generator Hostels.

Recently I talked about the new breed of luxury hostels that are popping up around Europe and appealing not only to younger travelers — as hostels traditionally have — but to baby boomer travelers as well.

Now the excellent travel site skift.com has a piece  interviewing Josh Wyatt, director of hospitality and leisure at the company that owns Generator Hostels, the leading brand of luxury hostels with eight locations and more on the way. It’s definitely worth a follow-up to hear what he has to say.

For starters, as the skift.com piece points out, Generator is “aggressively targeting” higher-income older travelers by offering a number of guest rooms for singles and couples that include private bath.

For instance, the 154-room Generator Barcelona, which opened this past spring, has devoted more than a fifth of its rooms to singles… Continue reading

The exotic Seychelles of the Indian Ocean. Photo from Seychelles.org

The exotic Seychelles of the Indian Ocean. Photo from Seychelles.org

I’m going to hazard a guess that most readers will not know where the Vanilla Islands are or what they are. At least not under that name.

The “Vanilla Islands” is actually a brand name used for marketing tourism to the seven Indian Ocean island countries of the Seychelles, Madagascar, Mauritius, Maldives, Mayotte, Reunion, and the Comoros. Most baby boomers will certainly be familiar with the Seychelles, Madagascar, Maldives, and Mauritius, though they may know less about Mayotte, Reunion and the Comoros.

I think it’s a wonderful idea for island countries spread widely across the Indian Ocean to join together for marketing purposes. (The brand name was established in 2010 and the grouping has since grown from four to seven.)

One of their goals is to reduce paperwork and join together in other ways to make it easier to visit… Continue reading

Do "real" travelers like to cruise -- or only just "tourists"? Photo by Clark Norton

Do “real” travelers like to cruise — or only just “tourists”? Photo by Clark Norton

Happy World Tourism Week, everyone.

This is the annual week (September 21-28 in 2013) when the United Nations World Tourism Organization — which supports sustainable tourism around the globe — celebrates global tourism and tries to keep it on an environmentally friendly path.

This year’s theme is “Tourism and Water: Protecting Our Common Future” — a vital topic because if we don’t protect the earth’s oceans, rivers, lakes and wetlands, we’re all in deep trouble, not just the tourism industry.

But the name “World Tourism Week” got me to thinking about a debate that’s been brewing among travel bloggers and websites recently on the connotations of the word “tourist” and whether or not “tourists” are lesser forms of life compared to “travelers.”

The thinking goes like this: “Tourist” implies someone who takes group tours, maybe… Continue reading

Jacada Travel will help you get close up to a zebra on a luxury African safari.

Jacada Travel will help you get close up to a zebra on a luxury African safari.

I wasn’t too familiar with Jacada Travel, a London, England-based company that specializes in luxury private guided tours in Latin America and Africa, but a new Gold Award from Travel Weekly in their 2013 Magellan Awards made me take notice.

Jacada Travel was named a “Best Overall” tour operator by a panel of travel industry leaders and insiders.

The company is just five years old and promises to deliver personalized travel experiences, which they’ll design for you based on your wants, needs, desires, and, no doubt, a few whims.

If cost is no object — or at least not the defining object — in your pursuit of bucket list safaris in Africa or Amazon tribal encounters in Peru, Jacada Travel will make it happen.

Baby boomers (as well as other travelers such as… Continue reading

The kitchen at the Cocomama hostel in Amsterdam.  Photo from Cocomama.

The kitchen at the Cocomama hostel in Amsterdam. Photo from Cocomama.

Decades ago, when baby boomers were in their 20s and backpacking around Europe, many discovered the joys of staying in youth hostels. The main joy is that they were cheap — really cheap — but they were also good places to meet like-minded travelers, pick up some budget travel tips from them, and maybe even make some new friends in a foreign city.

There were drawbacks: some hostels wouldn’t allow access to your room for several hours during the day; the rooms most often sported dormitory-like accommodations, complete with bunk beds for up to a dozen people, making privacy nonexistent; the bathrooms and showers were invariably down the hall (though so were those in inexpensive European hotels and pensions back in the day); cleanliness was often in short supply; and there was always the possibility of getting your possessions… Continue reading

Visa stamps in passports are getting easier to obtain. Photo by Clark Norton

Visa stamps in passports are, thankfully, getting easier to obtain. Photo by Clark Norton

Traditionally, some of the most painful experiences in traveling internationally have taken place before the trips even begin.

No, I’m not talking about buying the plane tickets, though that can be painful as well. I’m not even talking about packing your bags to satisfy TSA requirements.

I am talking about obtaining visas, especially for certain countries that seem to do everything they can think of to discourage visitors from actually coming and spending money within their borders — just about as short-sighted a policy as you can get, since tourism is now the world’s number one industry.

And yes, the U.S. is one of those countries. I wrote about Brazil sparring with the U.S. over mutually restrictive visa requirements in an earlier post.

But now, things are loosening up a bit, according to a report… Continue reading

Baby boomers are filling their bucket lists -- and spending money doing it. Photo from ROW Adventures

Baby boomers are filling their bucket lists — and spending money doing it. Photo from ROW Adventures

I came upon this observation from an unnamed pharmaceutical industry consultant, so I can’t give proper credit (though it appeared in the always provocative Bo Sacks media newsletter):

“No form of advertising is a safe, perpetual source of revenue, no matter how flush the advertiser or how desirable the audience. Because advertising has to change behavior, not just look good or get attention.”

His or her immediate point was that pharmaceutical ads aimed at doctors usually try to convince the physicians to change drug brands rather than cement a brand they currently prescribe to their patients — because for various reasons that’s where the potential profits lie — and I’m sure it’s an accurate observation…in many cases.

But it struck me as not necessarily true about  travel advertising — … Continue reading

The Carnival Freedom will carry baby boomer singles to the eastern Caribbean in November 2013. Photo from Carnival.

The Carnival Freedom will carry baby boomer singles to the eastern Caribbean in November 2013. Photo from Carnival.

Here’s a niche within a niche: a cruise not just for baby boomers, but for single baby boomers.

It makes sense, because while lots of cruises are filled with boomers, cruises — ever popular with couples, families and even groups of friends — can be difficult for single travelers.

Where does a single traveler sit at dinner? Where does a single traveler find a dance partner? Where does a single traveler find someone to just hang out with?

The problem may even be greater for travelers over 50.

To meet this need, Singles Cruise is sponsoring an eight-night “Baby Boomers Caribbean Adventure Singles Cruise” for singles born between 1946 and 1964, embarking November 16 from Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, aboard the Carnival Freedom.

The eastern Caribbean cruise will call at the islands of… Continue reading

In a previous post I wrote about “gramping” — grandparents camping with grandkids (but cheating a bit by bedding down in a lodge) — a name coined by an inn  in Ohio.

A king-sized bed lures baby boomers in one of the

A king-sized bed lures baby boomers in one of the “glamping” tents at the River Dance Lodge. Photo from River Dance Lodge.

Now comes “glamping” — a term that’s catching on as a clever contraction for “glamorous camping,” a combo that doesn’t always spring immediately to mind.

Glamping seems tailor-made for baby boomers, who may love the great outdoors but also tend to favor somewhat softer accommodations than, well, hard ground dotted with annoying pebbles.

Glamping, however, involves (at a minimum) tents with real beds inside — what’s not to like?

“Glamping” has been around for a while, though perhaps not by that name. The English used to go on African safaris in tents that… Continue reading

Starwood Hotels CEO Frits van Paasschen.

Starwood Hotels CEO Frits van Paasschen.

Starwood Hotels and Resorts CEO Frits van Paasschen, regarded as a visionary in the industry, has a fascinating take on what travelers will soon expect from their chosen lodgings (as recounted in this piece by Greg Oates in Skift.com).

“Today,” he recently told the hotel group’s annual sales pow wow in New Orleans, “a hotel brand can’t stand apart just by having a comfortable, reliable, clean room…that expectation today, driven by technology, is personalization.”

Van Paasschen gives the examples of Amazon.com and Facebook, who not only seem to know everything about their customers and users, they do know what their customers and users are looking for and like. (After all, we give them the information, and they know how to mine the data.)

“So how long will it be,” he asks, “before all of us expect a hotel brand where we spend… Continue reading

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According to government and private surveys:

  • Leading-edge baby boomers (born between 1946 and 1955) and seniors account for four out of every five dollars spent on luxury travel today.
  • Roughly half the consumer spending money in the U.S.--more than $2 trillion--is in the hands of leading-edge baby boomers and seniors.
  • Baby boomers (born 1946-1964) travel more than any other age group.
  • When asked what they would most like to spend their money on, baby boomers answered “travel” more than any other category, including improving their health or finances.

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