Roadtrippers, the world’s #1 road trip planning platform that redefines local, regional and cross-country travel, has released several data points surrounding the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on road-based trip planning activity. The volume of trips planned on Roadtrippers.com the week of April 27 was up 107 percent over the last week of March which was the pandemic-related low-point for trip-planning activity.
“Before closures started, we were seeing February trip planning intent that was up nearly 30 percent year-over-year, and we were pretty optimistic for 2020,” said Vice-President of Marketing & Communications for Togo Group Steven Hileman.
Trip planning activity then cratered to a low point at the end of March, a 76 percent decline from March of 2019. The volume of trips planned in April recovered to 65 percent of 2019 activity by the end of the month.
“April intent showed significant gains over the low-point in March, but when we overlaid our Togo RV persona and segmented the activity to RV owners specifically, the volume of trips planned by RVers has already bounced back close to pre-pandemic levels,” Hileman said. “Retired and college-age road trip planners also appeared to be far less affected by pandemic concerns, with those groups only seeing about a 20 to 25 percent decrease in activity.”
Roadtrippers, which became part of road-based travel and outdoor tourism technology platform Togo Group in 2018, has helped travelers plan more than 26 million trips covering more than eight billion miles, and has helped lay the groundwork for Togo Group’s new Togo RV app.
“We believe there’s a strong desire among RVers to get back out on the road, but it’s important that they do it safely, patiently and with good information,” Hileman said. “Many are using this sheltering time frame to plan their trips and begin navigating a patchwork of state-by-state restrictions. RVing feels like a natural reaction to the changes happening around us, and seeing the RV trip planning activity on Roadtrippers.com begin to rebound is a sign of good things ahead for the industry, Roadtrippers, and our up-and-coming Togo RV brand.”
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