Interest in RV travel remains high heading into the holiday season and appears poised to stay that way in 2022, according to the latest travel trends report from global online RV rental and outdoor travel marketplace Outdoorsy.
The annual report produced several intriguing findings after a year many travelers spent road tripping across the country, including the dates and destinations most RV travelers have circled in the final two months of 2021. For example, Thanksgiving topped Christmas and New Year's for the holiday with the most RV rental bookings this season, according to Outdoorsy, while top destinations for holiday travel are mostly warm-weather places such as Los Angeles, San Diego, Dallas, Phoenix, Houston, Austin, San Francisco, Miami and Las Vegas.
The trips won't come to a halt as travel continues its recovery in 2022 either as 91 percent of survey respondents indicated that they are planning to take a road trip next year. What's more, 83 percent of travelers added that they would be either somewhat likely or very likely to vacation via RV or campervan if there were COVID surges in 2022, and cleanliness is a big reason for that. Eight in 10 survey respondents cited cleanliness as the deciding factor when considering renting an RV. Amenities such as a full kitchen (57 percent), full bathroom (57 percent) and an indoor shower (43 percent) are also important features.
A majority of respondents (68 percent) believe that their families will be more in need of a road trip vacation in 2022 compared to previous years and nearly as many (63 percent) said that they had decided to drive instead of fly to their final destinations since the start of the pandemic, with many (52 percent) having driven more than 500 miles to reach their destination.
In what will be welcome news for campers heading into 2022, Outdoorsy estimates the average price per night for an RV rental in 2021 at $153 a night, just a slight jump compared to $151 a night in 2020 and $139 a night in 2019. Trailers, Class C RVs and campervans continue to be the most popular rentals.
Interestingly, first-time RV travelers are fueling the recent boom. According to the report, roughly two-thirds or approximately 67 percent of Outdoorsy web traffic stemmed from first-time RVers in 2021. Millennials lead the way in terms of bookings (37 percent), followed closely by Gen X (34 percent). Baby Boomers account for 17 percent of 2021 bookings.
"What we're hearing from travelers, and what was further confirmed by our internal data, is something we've known all along, the pull back of leisure travel in 2020 and 2021 has created a slingshot effect, a revenge travel effect if you will, that we'll see spring to life in 2022," Outdoorsy's co-founder and CEO Jeff Cavins said in a statement. "If anything has changed in the psychology of leisure travel since the start of the pandemic, it's a traveler's optimistic prioritization of factors like cleanliness, safety, and convenience-preferences that will continue to create first-time RVers and sustain demand for modes of self-contained travel."
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