Travel sector clings to hope as plans unravel
Katie Summers cancelled her wedding anniversary trip three times over the past 18 months. Now, the Omicron variant of COVID-19 means her January vacation to Hawaii with her husband may be added to the scrap heap.
“This one is a bucket-list trip for us,” says the 34-year-old radio host from Calgary.
“But it’s so expensive, because you’re budgeting for testing … your flight might get cancelled randomly and you have to pay for a hotel. It just suddenly has made travelling not as fun anymore.”
The prospect of sunny beaches and the threat of lost deposits have kept them from calling off the vacation so far. “We’re kind of taking the wait and see approach at this point,” she says.
Summers is one of many Canadians second-guessing their travel plans as information trickles out about Omicron, even as travel and tourism stakeholders see slivers of optimism in the latest updates.
Hotel and resort operators remain hopeful the strain is less serious than previous ones, says Walt Judas, CEO of the Tourism Industry
Association of B.C.
“But the news changes daily,” he said. “The biggest worry for our members is that things will shut back down again.
“Whistler is picking up — it’s not where it normally is,” Judas added, though he said large resorts in the interior have seen a wave of cancellations after the recent flooding in southern British Columbia. Meanwhile, hotels in Victoria and Vancouver are enjoying healthier bookings this month, in part due to the “slight return” of conferences and special events, he said.
But Beth Potter, CEO of the Tourism Industry Association of Canada, says the hoped-for surge in December travel and hospitality has not come to pass, while some guests have already called off holiday trips due to anxieties around Omicron.
Nonetheless, analysts at ATB Capital Markets say airline stocks have rebounded slightly from an Omicron-induced dip over the past two weeks.
“We view data coming out of the U.S. as a positive leading indicator for demand trends in Canada heading into the holiday season and 2022,” ATB said in a note to clients.