Holidays always start with the most important step: the search for the best offer, the best price. The cheapest price to go to Malaga (Spain) in a week, for example, is €78 for a return trip. If you fly to the same destination in July, you can expect to pay between €153 and €500.
A woman interviewed at Brussels airport brushed the price increase aside, stating that “the airlines want to make money”. Their planes were grounded for months and now that restrictions are relaxed and lifted all across Europe, the airlines want to make up for the lost profits.
Prices for summer holidays are currently higher than usual. This is less a deliberate decision by the tourism industry, but more the effects of an economic model: supply and demand, as Frank Bosteels, spokesman for Connections, explains. According to Bosteels, it is a well-known fact that capacity in the summer will be reduced because the airlines are “not sure that they will have a good summer”, on the one hand. On the other hand, business travellers have not yet returned to the airports. They are the ones who make the airlines profitable. As flights are reduced, as planes fill up, prices will become more and more expensive.
Some tour operators will only have 70% of their usual offer this summer. The price of holidays, accommodation, or flights will therefore depend directly on the number of travellers.
Pierre Fivet, spokesman of the Belgian association of tour operators, also points out that very few people booked early in 2021, meaning that almost nobody took advantage of the favourable offers at the beginning of the year.
The price for rental cars is also currently much higher than usual. In Spain, a car that can accommodate four people and two pieces of luggage will cost potential customers over €2,000 for a fortnight. Compared to the previous year, the price has become three times more expensive.
Broteels explains that car rental companies sold many of their cars in 2020 and reordered new ones for 2021. However, the problem is that now, car manufacturers struggle to keep up because they have supply problems.
The issue can be clearly seen when observing a car park for rental cars at Zaventem airport. Normally, all the spaces are taken. Nowadays, it is practically empty.
But this inflation does not necessarily discourage travellers. According to a study on travel intentions, Belgians are prepared to spend up to €919 on their holidays. This is €118 more than before the coronavirus crisis.
