Over the last few years, our entire relationship to travel has changed. First came the pandemic lockdown, followed by a period of whirlwind revenge travel—a collective wanderlust that turned into a barrage of ambitious trips to bucket-list destinations.
What happens next?
To better understand how Americans think about travel now, Thrillist worked with Vox Media’s Insights and Research team and partnered with The Circus, an insights and data storytelling consultancy, to survey 2,000 adults between the ages of 18 and 75. And what we found is that we shouldn’t be asking what will be the instigator of the next big change in travel habits and trends, but who.
Young people, and especially Gen Z, are fundamentally reshaping our views of tourism and the role travel plays in our lives. Although we surveyed a very small slice of the population, the results mirror much of what we’ve seen as travel journalists at Thrillist—and truthfully, it’s exciting.