Dear Travel Leaders, Sustainability Is Not a PR Exercise

Sixty-one percent of U.S. travelers want to vacation more sustainably — a 15 percent increase from last year — while 73 percent of global travelers say sustainable travel is important to them, with a majority feeling the need to make better choices as a result of recent climate change news.

That's the latest data from Booking.com's 2022 Sustainable Travel Report, released this month, surveyed more than 30,000 travelers across 32 countries and territories. “Sustainable travel is no longer the ambition of the few but of the many,” the report reads. 

It is indeed a compilation of warm and fuzzy consumer intentions and values. But the data belies an alarming ongoing pattern when it comes to consumer data on sustainability: a say-do discrepancy, the industry’s near-decade failure to catch up with the rising conscious consumer beyond marketing campaigns, and the mounting feelings of shame for long-haul flights with nearly one third of travelers now feeling this way.

It all points to the fact that industry leaders as a whole have been saying a lot about sustainability, but they're not doing nearly enough, fast enough.

Travelers may be more interested in traveling sustainably — who’d disagree about not contributing to burning the planet or exploiting host communities — but in the eight years since Booking.com’s reports and other surveys indicating the same, the data shows they remain unsure of how to do it, where to find the information, or simply lack initiative. 

In spite of some progress from online travel agencies such as Booking.com’s Travel Sustainable search tool, the knowledge is lacking but so is the conviction to dig further to find the few options that exist, and put one’s money where one’s mouth is. Cost and convenience continue to trump sustainable travel decisions.

“[I]t’s clear