Travel spending has steadily been improving since Memorial Day weekend, research shows.
Now that the summer has come to an end, the industry can get a clearer picture of the effect the pandemic had on summer travel.
Cardlytics, which tracks consumer spending, found that travel spending slowly improved from Memorial Day weekend to Labor Day weekend. The data in no way compares to 2019 but is a positive sign that travelers are beginning to feel safe enough to take a vacation.
Overall, travel saw its lowest point in April with a drop of as much as 70 percent. Since that time, it has slowly continued to rise. At the end of August, Cardlytics data shows that travel was down between 30-40 percent of normal levels.
Air travel picked up by a total of eight points between May 28, 2020, and September 3, 2020. Hotel bookings increased 28 points between the two holidays, and car rental bookings were up by a total of 19 points. Travel aggregators moved up 20 points as well.
Alternative lodging, which was up by 20 percent in the summer of 2019, remained about the same in 2020. It was one of the only bright spots and segments that didn't see a downturn.
While travel spending is slowly improving, it's far from normal levels. Part of that is likely due to a decline in discretionary spending. Cardlytics Recovery Indicator showed that we have a ways to go before returning to normal.
Overall, discretionary spending is down 23 percent. In some places, such as Hawaii, discretionary spending is down more than 40 percent. However, many states are close to normal, including much of the southern states such as Florida, Arizona, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, Florida and South Carolina.
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