Thais choose travel over holiday gifts, survey finds
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Thai people choose to experience the cool weather over staying at home to exchange holiday presents, according to a survey from Hotels.com.
The survey was conducted in 28 countries including some in Europe, North America, South America and the Asia-Pacific region, with more than 8,700 respondents, exploring people’s travel preferences during Christmas and New Year.
For Thailand, the results show that more than 90 per cent of respondents prefer to spend the holiday season travelling, especially to cooler destinations, rather than sitting at home and swapping gifts with family members.
More than 35.7 per cent of Thai respondents said they hoped to travel to cooler destinations this New Year season.
This coincides with the Hotels.com data on Thailand’s top destination search for this holiday season, which showed Chiang Mai as gaining the most searches for accommodation bookings during the December 20-31 period.
The survey found that for most people outside Thailand, when talking about Christmas and New Year, spending time with families and sparkling decorations tend to be the top two subjects that come to mind. However, Thais buck this global trend, with more than 78 per cent hoping to spend their festive holiday in hotels rather with their extended families.
Moreover, 57 per cent of Thai respondents do not place importance on a hotel’s holiday decorations as a factor in booking a stay there.
