Sales and marketing director, Paul Riches, said: ‘Industry pundits have been saying for weeks that it is all about the lates market this year. However, there has been concern about when this phenomenon became a reality.
‘We’re delighted that we appear to be trading ahead of the market.’
In the past six weeks the volume of late bookings has peaked at more than 20% as consumers start to firm up their travel plans for summer. Overall bookings in the first half of June, meanwhile, were up 15%.
The fastest growing destinations for youtravel.com in 2009 to date are in Greece, with Rhodes and Crete 27% ahead of this time last year.
youtravel.com also saw double-digit growth in May for Turkey, Portugal, Greece and Tunisia.
Even the Costa del Sol has seen bookings rise 14% compared to this time last year.
Riches added: ‘Greece and Spain have been stalwarts of the British travel industry for decades; it’s going to take more than currency fluctuations to put the Brits off travelling to these destinations.’
He said customers visiting all-inclusive resorts in Spain and Greece are not so worried about the strong euro.
youtravel is also seeing the increase in late booking for the pre-summer shoulder season being mirrored in September and October.
Riches said: ‘In our minds, there is no doubt that booking levels will continue to grow in the next few weeks, even before the peak season hits us.’
More on late sales from e-tid.com:
Lower costs/stronger late prices boost Carnival Q2s (19/06/2009)
Consumer buying ‘up and down’ says Kuoni (12/06/2009)
Skyscanner reports 85% rise in traffic (09/06/2009)
No sign yet of late bookings (05/06/2009)
TUI UK introduces coach/excess bag fees on lates (01/06/2009)
And more on youtravel:
youtravel beach hotels available on Galileo (19/02/2009)
youtravel/easyCruise herald successful deal (11/12/2008)
youtravel expands portfolio (12/11/2008)