Travel And Tourism in Switzerland

Euromonitor International's Travel And Tourism in Switzerland report offers a comprehensive guide to the market at a national level. It looks at travel accommodation, transportation, car rental, tourist attractions and retail travel. It identifies the leading companies and offers strategic analysis of key factors influencing the market, including background information on disposable income, annual leave and holiday taking habits.

Get immediate access to strategic market analysis when you buy reports online

Why buy this report

• Get insight into trends in market performance
• Pinpoint growth sectors and identify factors driving change
• Identify market and brand leaders and understand the competitive environment

Product coverage

Airline capacity and utilisation; Arrivals by country of origin; Arrivals by mode of transport; Arrivals by purpose of visit; Car rental services by sector; Demand factors; Departures by destination; Departures by mode of transport; Departures by purpose of visit; Domestic tourism by destination; Domestic tourism by mode of transport; Tourism receipts and expenditure; Tourist attractions; Transportation; Travel accommodation; Travel retail services

Executive summary

Increased tourist movements not enough to keep spending level in 2005, as average spending per traveller drops

Total tourism spending declined by 1% in current value terms in 2005. This comes as somewhat of a surprise in the general climate of a still recovering tourism industry. The positive trend in the industry is confirmed by the increasing number of travellers in Swiss tourism. Arrivals to Switzerland grew by over 5% in 2005, while departures and domestic tourist trips each grew by around 2%. But in the meantime, in current value terms, outgoing tourism spending dropped by close to 5%, while incoming tourism spending was down 1% and domestic down 2%.

Travellers in 2005 turned to more frequent, less expensive forms of travel and at the same time, prices were down to increase volume growth of travel and tourism now that the industry has virtually recovered from bad years and needs to expand.

The coming of age of the demographic giants of Asia are now set to become big business for Swiss tourism

In 2005, one very remarkable statistic concerning the Swiss tourism industry is the exponential growth of the number of Chinese travellers to the country, followed by the Indians. With the SARS epidemic behind and global economic recovery, China has resumed its trend of double-digit growth in tourists heading to Switzerland. But 2005 saw a spectacular increase in Chinese visitors with 90% growth to 141,300. Everyone is aware of the huge potential of China, and as the Chinese government continues to liberalise travel abroad, it seems that Switzerland, a strong vehicle of the Western way of life, is receiving much attention.

With Indian travellers also passing the 100,000 visitor mark for the first time in 2005, Asian travellers represent the best potential for growth that Switzerland has seen in decades.

Shorter, more frequent but less expensive trips are the latest trend in Swiss tourism

In 2005 the traditional 2-week trips are increasingly replaced by either trips shorter than one week or longer than 2-3 weeks. The Swiss made on average 2.5 trips this year. Over the review period, there was a tendency amongst Swiss travellers to split or shorten the main holiday and, at the same time, take an increased number of short breaks. The number of shorter breaks of 1-3 days is growing. Several factors can be evoked, but the main ones are the increasing popularity of weekend breaks thanks to better and cheaper transportation, namely within Europe, as well as the increasing individualism of households which often do not have children allowing for easier travel.

Growth of Internet sales picking up again after slowing in certain sectors, still has much potential

Growth of Internet transactions in 2005 has exceeded 50% in travel accommodation, transportation, car rental and travel retail. This represents a gain of momentum in most sectors and indicates that consumer confidence is high and that more people are still learning to use the Internet to its full possibilities.

However, with the exception of a very few areas, Internet sales still represented less than 5% of total sales in all sectors of the industry in 2005. In light of the sheer practicality of Internet reservations and sales, this indicates there is still vast potential for Internet sales in the Swiss tourism industry.

Introduction of low-cost car rental and re-centering of travel retail market the highlights of the competitive environment

The player with the most potential in the Swiss travel and tourism industry is surely easyCar, the new low-cost car rental agency by the easyGroup and which broke directly into the top players of the sector still dominated by Hertz. Elsewhere, while Deutsche Lufthansa and Swiss International Airlines share the skies, Accor Hotels is still battling strongly to establish its position and consolidate the Swiss hotel sector. Finally, travel retail has seen strong activity in terms of mergers and acquisitions by the main players such as Hotelplan, Kuoni and TUI to re-centre their core activity and focus on consolidating the sector.

Outlook bright for Swiss travel and tourism industry

Overall expenditure in the industry is expected to increase steadily over the forecast period. The greatest source of growth should be incoming tourism expenditure and the sectors doing the best are expected to be transportation and car rental as tourists become more mobile and expect to travel and discover more and more.